


Become the Beast

by memequeen1127



Series: The One You Feed [2]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Drama and Romance, Emotional Introspection, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, M/M, Missing Scenes, Mutual Pining, POV Multiple, Season 3 rewrite, Will Graham Loves Hannibal Lecter
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:41:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 58,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27201269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/memequeen1127/pseuds/memequeen1127
Summary: All his feelings about Hannibal existed in a swirling tempest that was too powerful for Will to consciously control, but he was sailing through the storm like he was sailing across the sea — with determination, impulsivity, and no clear plan. There was only the need to go forward, towards Hannibal.Will didn’t know what was going to happen once he found him. He didn’t know what he was going to do. Will was just as likely to kill Hannibal as he was to forgive him.I forgive you, Will. Will you forgive me?~A rewrite of season 3 because I wanted to know what everyone was feeling and add some important scenes that were missing. 1 chapter = 1 episode!
Relationships: Brief (Canon?) Hannibal Lecter/Antony Dimmond, Brief Canon Hannibal Lecter/Bedelia Du Maurier, Brief Canon Will Graham/Molly Foster, Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Series: The One You Feed [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1936444
Comments: 62
Kudos: 106





	1. Antipasto

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! 
> 
> I decided to write this because, although I loved season 3, I felt like the pace was a little too fast and I missed things. I am not changing anything that happened, merely going more in-depth into scenes that did and adding on new ones that I felt happened off-screen. I am not rewriting every single scene in season 3, mainly the hannigram ones because that works best for the story (and because y'all already know what happened lol). 
> 
> That being said, each chapter is still about 6k long (or more, depending on the episode). I wanted to do this right, so I didn't rush it. I hope you guys enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it!
> 
> Title is from this absolutely amazing [fansong](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmVzeriU5m0) made especially for Hannibal. 
> 
> This first chapter is episode 1, so expect only Hannibal's POV. Don't worry, next chapter will be Will POV!
> 
> Enjoy :)

The night was cold in Paris, but that only made Hannibal’s blood rush more. He hadn’t ridden a motorcycle in years, and he missed the adrenaline flooding his body every time he zipped around cars and sped faster than was strictly legal. It wasn’t the act of breaking the law that excited Hannibal; it never was. It was simply how the act made him feel  _ alive.  _

When he arrived at his destination, he removed his helmet and allowed the night air to cool his skin. He was not used to his longer hair yet, and it was sticking to the back of his neck. 

It was late already and he surely had a long night ahead, but he was not tired. Hannibal was far too experienced to feel fatigue. Besides, the task this evening only required minimal focus.

He did not bother to dress for the occasion, as he would not stay long. He carried his helmet with him and walked into the black-tie farewell party, sliding around unassuming guests like a tiger moving through long grass and placing himself in a spot by the bar with an excellent view of his quarry who, after tonight, nobody would miss. 

Suddenly, Hannibal sensed someone watching him. He turned to the side and found a man at the bar, about Will’s age, smiling at him. His smile was bright and friendly, but Hannibal didn’t care for it. It ended the man’s slight resemblance to Will. 

The man sidled over, eyes twinkling, and offered a name. “Antony Dimmond.” 

“Boris Jakov,” Hannibal replied smoothly. 

“I’d offer a hand, but…” he smiled again. 

Hannibal mirrored with his own friendly smile. “It’s a double-fisted kind of bash.” He looked the man over, once again struck by his similarity to Will. However, he was quite tall. Will was always slightly shorter than Hannibal, about three inches shorter to be precise. 

Antony Dimmond chuckled. “Do you know Roman well?” 

Hannibal tilted his head. 

“You were staring with the thinly-veiled disdain of a man who does,” Antony explained, eyes still sparkling. “I was his TA at Cambridge. He was insufferable even then.”

He chugged his champagne and Hannibal processed. This man knew Roman Fell quite well, but didn’t seem to like him very much. Interesting. Although Hannibal did not choose the man for his rudeness, it seemed it would be a bonus. 

  
  


“Have you read his books?” Antony asked, pulling, presumably, one such book out of his coat to show Hannibal. “They’re terrible!” he whispered, still smiling. 

Hannibal said nothing, but Antony appeared to like that. “You know they’re terrible, you’re just too polite to say,” he flirted. “Blink if you agree.” 

Hannibal blinked. 

Antony grinned. “See?” 

He turned back to his former professor. “That doesn’t stop him squatting over his keyboard and depositing a fresh one every six to eight months.” Hannibal snagged a passing champagne class and took a swig. 

“It takes me six to eight months to write one line.” Hannibal’s ears perked up. This man writes?

“Why?” he asked, deciding to match this man’s game and be friendly. Hannibal had no trouble manufacturing twinkles in his own eyes if the occasion called for it. 

“Poetry is hard.” Antony smiled, as if the answer was obvious. 

“Too hard for Roman,” he continued. “Well, it’s easier to slide into academia and dissect the work of others than it is to stand by his own words.” He leaned towards Hannibal. 

Hannibal leaned back. “One can appreciate another’s words without dissecting them.” He made eye contact for a second before returning his gaze to Dr. Fell. “Though, on occasion, dissection is the only thing that will do.” 

* * *

Hannibal loved Florence. He was glad to be back, though he would have preferred to have shared the experience with a different companion. 

Bedelia was not all bad. Hannibal had always found her to be interesting, in the way a cat found a canary interesting — clever, perhaps, and fun to toy with, but unquestionably a future meal. 

He stood at the balcony and looked out onto the streets below, and remembered his time spent in this city as a young man. “We are among the palaces built 600 years ago by the merchant princes, the kingmakers, and the connivers of Renaissance Florence.” 

Bedelia drifted next to him and handed him a glass of brandy. Hannibal looked at the amber liquid and thought of whiskey. 

“As connivers of modern Florence,” Bedelia toasted. 

Hannibal considered the romance of his favorite city and turned away from its view. “I found a peace here that I would preserve. I’ve killed hardly anybody during our residence.” 

Hannibal was proud of himself, all things considered. He had left Will in a pool of his own blood, carved up by Hannibal’s forgiveness. It ached, but he had flown to Florence without him, with someone else in his stead. He had not planned for it, and the identities he had forged for himself, Will, and Abigail were useless, but Hannibal had always been good at thinking on his feet. 

When he and Bedelia had arrived, fresh from Paris with new identities, Hannibal made sure to steer them straight into the smaller bedroom. Bedelia saw the master bedroom but said nothing, undoubtedly knowing exactly why Hannibal did not want them staying there. There were too many objects painful to look upon, and too much empty space to haunt Hannibal with Will’s ghost. 

Thus, although Hannibal had a well stocked wardrobe in the master bedroom, he wasted no time in supplying himself with new clothes. Bedelia got herself some as well, and they split the small closet down the middle, careful not to touch fabrics. 

All these months, Hannibal had acted like the perfect gentleman. He did not touch Bedelia without her consent, he did not feed her what she did not wish to eat, and he did not kill anyone that did not need to be killed. 

It seemed Bedelia was not as impressed with Hannibal’s actions. “You created a vacancy at the  _ Palazzo Capponi _ by removing the former curator.” 

“A simple process requiring a few seconds’ work on the old man,” Hannibal shrugged. “And, a modest outlay of two bags of cement.” 

“You no longer have ethical concerns, Hannibal.” Bedelia observed. “You have aesthetical ones.”

Hannibal’s lip twitched upwards. Bedelia had not been his psychiatrist in any official capacity in some time, which was perhaps best considering the many professional boundaries they were currently crossing. It amused him that Bedelia was still so desperate to get a look at him behind the veil. 

“Ethics become aesthetics,” he stated. 

“You seem more interested in making appearances than maintaining them,” Bedelia responded after some thought. “Would you?”

She gestured to the zipper on the back of her dress and Hannibal obliged, setting his glass down before moving to stand close behind her. “If this is about my position at the  _ Palazzo _ ,” he said conversationally, “once the path was cleared, I won the job fairly. On my merits.” 

He unzipped the expensive dress in one fluid motion. 

“Yes, even the most contentious Florentines can’t resist the verse of Dante ringing off the frescoed walls,” Bedelia said, moving towards the washroom. 

“One contentious Florentine can,” Hannibal remarked. 

Bedelia started the bath with a squeak of the faucet. “Have you given serious thought to...eating Professor Sogliato?”

She sounded frightened, Hannibal mused. Frightened, but brave enough to try and hide it. 

“My killing Sogliato now would not preserve the peace,” he replied. 

“Your peace is without morality.”

“Morality doesn’t exist,” Hannibal said firmly. “Only morale.” 

Bedelia smiled as she considered that. “How you feel today.” 

Hannibal turned his attention back onto her. “How do  _ you _ feel today?”

He was curious to discover when Bedelia would call him out on his intention to preserve the peace — or rather, his appearance of that intention. Tonight, it seemed, she chose to believe the falsehood that he really did want to preserve the peace. 

“I still believe I am in conscious control of my actions. Given your history,” she replied softly, “that’s a good day.” 

* * *

_ Hannibal washed the blood off himself under the steady stream of the shower, and if a stray tear mixed in with the blood and the water to swirl down the drain then so be it. Tonight had been a night of betrayal, loss, and uncontrollable forgiveness.  _

_ He forgave Will for his betrayal, then showed his forgiveness by engaging in an act of betrayal himself. He wanted to make Will feel the pain he was feeling, but it didn’t make him feel any better knowing he had succeeded.  _

_ “Did you think you could change me? Like I changed you?” he had asked.  _

_ Will’s response was still ringing in Hannibal’s ears. His huffed laugh, and his searing words.  _

_ “I already did.”  _

_ Hannibal hadn’t realized it until then, but Will was right. He had changed. Hannibal wasn’t quite sure how he felt about Will Graham holding that sort of power over him. He hadn’t experienced anything like it since… _

_ Mischa.  _

_ Hannibal stayed in the shower until his hands pruned, allowing his superficial wounds to be flushed clean. He took his time drying off, letting the water drip off him as he patted his face dry with a towel. He stepped out of the shower and towards the sink, intending to dress in the clean clothes he stole on his way here, when he heard the unmistakable click of a gun being cocked.  _

_ Hannibal paused and took a deep, tired breath. It seemed Bedelia had come home.  _

_ “May I get dressed?” he asked, turning towards her, unashamed of his nakedness. Bedelia was seated on the edge of her bed, a gun in one hand and a glass of wine in the other.  _

_ “You may,” she granted.  _

_ Hannibal folded up his towel and started getting dressed.  _

_ “What have you done, Hannibal?” she asked. Hannibal knew she was scared, wondering why in the world he was at her home of all places. From what she knew of him — and what she didn’t — the answer could be nothing good.  _

_ “I’ve taken off my person suit,” Hannibal said lightly as he pulled on some clean trousers.  _

_ Bedelia blinked. “You let them see you,” she realized.  _

_ Hannibal exhaled and thought of Will’s expression just before he gutted him. “I let them see enough.” _

_ “How does it feel,” Bedelia asked, her eyes still glued to him, “being seen?” _

_ “Well, you’re in no position to ask, Dr. du Maurier. You ended our patient-psychiatrist relationship.” There was no way Hannibal was ever going to tell her the depth of what he was feeling right now. It wasn’t for her. The white-hot pain was still under his skin, and he wouldn’t hesitate to kill Bedelia if she asked him about it again.  _

_ Bedelia was smart enough to heed his warning. “I lacked the appropriate skills to continue your therapy.” _

_ Hannibal shrugged on his shirt. “I never found you to be lacking.” _

_ Bedelia’s face twitched with fear. “I’m sorry I didn’t provide you with a suitable substitute for therapy.” Her apology sounded quite sincere, considering it was wrenched out of her. _

_ There was another slight pause, then: “Is Will Graham still alive?” _

_ Hannibal felt the wave of pain he had been swimming through that night roar up again, threatening to drown him. He wanted to skin Bedelia alive for speaking his name, no matter how much he valued her therapy.  _

_ Images flew through his mind, most of them focused on Will holding onto him in pain, or huddled on the bloody floor clutching at his gaping wound. “Will Graham was not a suitable substitute for therapy.” _

_ It hurt to admit — that Will had not chosen to be with him.  _

_ “What was he?” Bedelia dared ask. Hannibal was unsure whether it was misplaced bravery or sheer stupidity that made her speak, and turned to make eye contact for the first time in their entire conversation.  _

_ “Is this professional curiosity?” he countered, sharply.  _

_ Bedelia did not back down. “Almost entirely.” _

_ Hannibal let his mask slip a bit to show his displeasure and took a few predatory steps towards her. “Do you trust me?” he asked in a low voice. _

_ Bedelia exhaled, trying to regulate her fear. “Not entirely.” _

_ Hannibal broke eye contact to button his sleeves. “Have you taken into consideration my beliefs about your intentions?”  _

_ “My intentions?” _

_ Hannibal looked up. He was turning the personal questions back on her, and it was working perfectly. She did not fight against his evasive techniques, and he knew why. Her intentions had always been rather obvious. “Human motivation can be little more than lucid greed.” _

_ Bedelia swallowed, knowing that she had been seen. Her greed to know Hannibal was clear and distasteful; however, he would allow it since he could use it to his advantage.  _

_ “Greed,” Bedelia agreed. “And blind optimism.” _

_ Hannibal was still but his eyes were supremely satisfied. “You’re optimistic I won’t kill you.” _

_ Bedelia uncocked the gun and set it on the bed beside her. Hannibal turned away to finish getting dressed, the immediate threat having been dealt with. Bedelia was going to be his chess piece, all of her own volition. Greed and blind optimism, indeed.  _

* * *

Hannibal stayed late at the  _ Palazzo _ that day, finishing up his speech to the  _ Studiolo _ . He left his office and entered the courtyard just in time to see the golden light of the setting sun beautifully drape over the statues and the flowers. He was in a good mood after planning such a captivating lecture that would surely grant him tenured employment, and was already thinking of what he might cook for dinner. 

“Hello!” A familiar voice called out to him. Hannibal’s sharp eyes quickly sought out the source of the hail, and was pleasantly surprised to see the man from Paris strolling over to him. The man who looked like Will. The man who knew Dr. Fell. 

“Bonjour!” he greeted, that unforgettable smile once again gracing his face. “Mr. Jakov, isn’t it? We met in Paris a few months back.”

Hannibal said nothing but took the hand that was offered to him. 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. It’s just, here I was, and then there you were… I never forget a face,” he explained. 

“Antony Dimmond,” Hannibal said with a smile. 

Antony beamed. “Nice to be remembered.”

Hannibal’s smile turned slightly more suggestive. “You’re hard to forget.”

“What are you doing in Florence?” Antony asked curiously. “Are you working with Roman?”

Hannibal pretended to be taken aback by the inquiry. “Dr. Fell?”

“I heard he took an appointment at the  _ Capponi _ library.”

“Yes, he’s the new curator and translator at the  _ Palazzo Capponi _ .” Hannibal said smoothly. Antony seemed to have some substance under his pretty face. Hannibal was a little impressed at his ability to stay on topic and get the answers he wanted. This man didn’t miss much. 

“Evidently the last one eloped with a woman. Or someone’s money. Or both,” Antony grinned. 

“That’s the commonly held belief,” Hannibal said quietly. 

There was a slight pause, then Hannibal smiled again at Antony. “You just missed Roman.” 

“Did I?” he questioned. “Oh, was hoping to take the piss.” 

They both chuckled, and Hannibal decided to take advantage of this unexpected opportunity. “Spare the piss for the time being. If you’re free, my wife and I would love to have you for dinner.”

* * *

Hannibal watched with amusement as Bedelia tried, and failed, to conceal the shaking of her hand as she brought the oyster to her mouth. 

“How well do you know the Fells?” she asked Antony, obviously trying to turn away his attention from her unease. Antony smiled and answered. 

“As well as anybody. Which’d be not really,” he said. “Lydia a friend of yours?”

Bedelia’s eyes widened imperceptibly at the question. “Not really,” she said, eyes dropping back down to her oysters. 

Hannibal kept watching her, enjoying her discomfort and curious to see what she would do, how well she could lie to the first stranger that Hannibal invited back to their apartment. 

“I’d be surprised to hear she had one,” Antony remarked. “We share a mutual detestation. She disapproves of my disapproval.”

Antony’s attention was focused on Bedelia, and though Hannibal could not blame him — she was a beautiful woman, after all — Hannibal wanted to find out more about him. 

“What do you disapprove of?” Hannibal asked. 

“Roman, mainly. Lydia isn’t quite bright enough to see I’m just intimidated,” Antony admitted without any shame. “Roman does, of course. How he loves to strike fear.”

Hannibal walked around the table to deposit his chosen food for Bedelia on her plate. “Dante wrote that fear is almost as bitter as death.”

She looked up at him, her armor beginning to crack. “Dante wasn’t dead when he wrote it,” she murmured, her smile not quite reaching her eyes. 

Hannibal gave her a small grin and turned his attention back to his guest. “Traveling alone, Antony?” he asked lightly. 

“The only way I travel.” Bedelia was now staring at Hannibal with undisguised fear, but he ignored her with amusement as he finished plating everyone’s food. 

“Roman is speaking to the  _ Studiolo _ Friday, on Dante,” Hannibal announced as he sat down. “You should come.” 

“Sounds appropriately hellish.” Antony grinned. Hannibal smiled at his answer and regarded Bedelia’s now openly fearful face with likewise open amusement. 

Antony’s eyes fell upon Bedelia’s plate with interest. “Are you avoiding meats?” he asked. 

Hannibal held back a smirk at the question. He knew inviting Antony for dinner was a good idea. 

Bedelia swallowed. “I’m trying not to eat anything with a central nervous system.” 

Antony’s smile was friendly. “Oysters, acorns, and Marsala,” he said, nodding to her plate. “It’s what the ancient Romans would feed animals to improve their flavor.” 

Hannibal watched closely as the realization hit Bedelia. She suddenly stopped chewing and her eyes widened, glancing up at Hannibal. He stared right back at her and continued to eat, a smile tugging at his lips. He wondered when she was going to figure out that she had an expiration date. It seemed she needed some outside help.

Bedelia recovered rather quickly. “My husband,” she replied slowly, “has a very sophisticated palate. He’s very particular about how I taste.” 

Well, she wasn’t lying. 

Antony raised his eyebrows and glanced back and forth between Hannibal and Bedelia with deepened interest. He leaned forward. “Is it that kind of party?” he murmured suggestively. 

There was a small silence where Hannibal smirked at Bedelia to gauge her response. Inviting Antony to dinner had turned out to be an amazing idea. Hannibal was thoroughly enjoying himself now, on account of Bedelia’s fear and Antony’s eagerness for sexual intimacy.

Hannibal toyed with his fork as he considered Bedelia. He would like nothing more than for dinner to turn into “that kind of party,” but he wasn’t going to agree if Bedelia was uncomfortable with the idea. He was not that kind of predator. 

As the silence dragged on and Bedelia remained quite uncomfortable, Hannibal smiled slyly. “It’s not that kind of party,” he told Antony. 

“No,” Bedelia added, suddenly exhausted. “It really isn’t.”

Antony took the rejection gracefully. “Shame. You were both suddenly so fascinating.”

He looked at Hannibal and Hannibal looked back, allowing himself a honestly amused smile and a twinkle in his eyes. Something passed between them the longer their eyes remained locked, and Hannibal was supremely satisfied to find that Antony did not take the recent rejection to be an all-encompassing rejection. 

Dinner passed quickly after that and Hannibal behaved himself, only mildly flirting with Antony while dutifully paying attention to his “wife” at the same time. Bedelia only spoke when she was spoken to, her unease at being around the two of them plain. Hannibal knew Antony was astute and picked up on this, but he undoubtedly thought Bedelia’s anxiety was due to her husband’s flirting and not the prospect of being eaten. 

After dinner Hannibal guided Antony out the door, always the gentleman. He would not proposition the boy tonight, not when it would be seen as disrespectful to Bedelia. He was content to wait for the right moment, and as Antony caught his eye on his way out Hannibal knew he felt the same. 

“ _ Buonasera! _ ” Antony bid them with a smile. 

“ _ Buonasera _ ,” Hannibal and Bedelia replied together. 

He shut the front door gently and slowly turned around to face Bedelia, his polite smile gone from his features as he regarded her. 

“You let him go,” Bedelia noted, surprise in her words. 

Hannibal tilted his head slightly, amusement once again dancing in his eyes. “What would you have me do, Bedelia?” 

She inhaled as she considered his words. Hannibal brushed past her, pleased that he so easily pushed her to think about killing Antony Dimmond. She was not as easily malleable as Will — she was too afraid of her spark for cruelty, and did not revel in it as Will did — but she was still tractable. Hannibal had fun toying with her tonight. 

Bedelia did not answer his question but instead asked one of her own. “Are you going to sleep with him?” 

“Probably,” Hannibal mused as he cleared their plates from the table. “Does that surprise you? Or are you perhaps jealous?”

Bedelia scoffed and took another sip of her wine. “I am not surprised, nor I am jealous. He does bear a remarkable resemblance to Will Graham, does he not?” 

Hannibal does not deny it. “Indeed he does. There are noticeable differences, however. Will did not smile nearly as much as Mr. Dimmond does.” 

Bedelia waved him off. “An easily overlooked trait. After all, you do not need to look at his face to do what you want to do with him.”

Hannibal smiled widely. “No, I do not.” 

“I will not join in,” she declared. 

“You made that abundantly clear when he proposed it, Bedelia,” Hannibal assured, rolling his sleeves further up his arms as he started washing the dishes. “Our own intimacy can be separate from my intimacy with Mr. Dimmond.” 

Bedelia drained her wine glass and sighed. “My attraction to you is inconvenient,” she said. “It will most likely get me killed and eaten.”

“It most likely will,” Hannibal agreed. 

“Will Antony Dimmond’s afford him the same?” she wondered.

Hannibal considered it as he finished cleaning the plates. Antony’s resemblance to Will functioned as a blessing for Hannibal as much as it did a curse. “It could go either way,” he conceded. “I am fine with exploring this path and seeing what it brings me.” 

“As you often are,” Bedelia muttered. “One could argue that spontaneity will be your downfall.” 

Hannibal busied himself with drying the dishes and did not turn around to face her as he responded, “One could argue that it already has.”

* * *

The applause gradually came to a polite stop as guests trickled out of the lecture hall and the  _ Studiolo _ stood to congratulate Hannibal. He shook a lot of hands and returned lots of smiles, pleased but not at all surprised that his lecture on Dante was well-received. 

“Thank you for your kind attention,” Hannibal told them all before wishing them farewell. Two men lingered behind the rest, and Hannibal focused his attention on the one that approached him first. 

“Would you say I secured my position, Professor Sogliato?” Hannibal asked without looking at him. 

“The  _ Studiolo _ seemed… satisfied,” Professor Sogliato acknowledged stiffly. 

“Satisfied?” Antony Dimmond waltzed up with a knowing smirk. “I thought the applause was downright enthusiastic, in its soft and dusty way.” 

His eyes were fixed on Hannibal, but Hannibal did not look at him either and continued to slowly pack up his materials. 

Professor Sogliato hummed begrudgingly then politely responded to Antony. “ _ Dottore _ Fell is a friend of yours?”

Hannibal’s ears perked up, curious as to what Antony would say. 

“I was his TA at Cambridge,” he replied. “The tales I could tell…”

Hannibal finally looked up to face him, and Antony’s sparkling eyes met his. 

Sogliato smiled. “Please do.”

Hannibal broke their gaze, but continued to feel Antony’s eyes on him as he responded, “What kind of friend would I be?”

Sogliato’s face turned annoyed. ‘What kind of friend, indeed.  _ Dottore _ ,” he said in farewell, leaving Hannibal and Antony alone. 

It was only then, when they were completely alone, that Hannibal stopped his movements to pack up and turned to face Antony’s interest. He was smiling, obviously pleased to be in on the secret, regardless of not knowing the exact nature of the secret. Hannibal could tell he was intrigued, and perhaps even more attracted to Hannibal now than he was before. 

Antony gave him a flirty look and spun around to peruse the displayed collection. “An exposition of atrocious torture instruments appeals to connoisseurs of the very worst in mankind,” he started. 

Hannibal followed behind him and they both made their way through the collection. “Now that ceaseless exposure has calloused us into the lewd and vulgar, it is instructive to see what still seems wicked to us.”

“What still slaps the clammy flab of our submissive consciousness hard enough to get our attention?” Antony played along, not expressing fear of any kind. Hannibal liked that. Unlike Bedelia, Will was never afraid of him. Neither was Antony Dimmond, it seemed. 

“What wickedness has your attention, Mr. Dimmond?”

Antony stopped walking. “Yours,” he said, turning around. _ “Dr. Fell.” _

Hannibal did not smile but that didn’t seem to phase Antony, who gave his own smile and spun around to continue walking past the various torture instruments. “I have no delusions about morality. If I did, I would’ve gone to  _ la polizia _ .”

“I’m curious as to what fate befell Dr. Fell to see you here in his stead,” Antony continued.

Hannibal smiled slightly and nodded to the closest torture tool. “You may have to strap me to the breaking wheel to loosen my tongue.”

“You overestimate my affection for the genuine Dr. Fell,” Antony murmured, his eyes burning into Hannibal’s. “Clearly, you found him as distasteful as I did.”

Hannibal’s smile grew wider. “On the contrary.”

Antony furrowed his brows in confusion for a moment before he laughed quietly. He took a step closer to Hannibal and whispered, “We can twist ourselves into all manner of uncomfortable positions just to maintain appearances — with or without a breaking wheel.”

Hannibal’s eyes flickered down to Antony’s lips. “Are you here to twist me into an uncomfortable position?”

“I’m here to help you untwist,” Antony whispered coyly, “to our mutual benefit.” 

Hannibal smirked, then nodded. “Would you like to accompany me back to my apartment, Mr. Dimmond?” 

Antony mirrored his smirk in response. “It would be my pleasure.”

* * *

Hannibal unlocked the door to his apartment and looked over his shoulder. “Do not worry about my wife,” he said. “We have already talked about this.”

Antony placed a warm hand on his shoulder. “I wasn’t thinking about her at all.” 

Hannibal grinned and opened the door. “Neither was I.” 

They strode into the apartment together, and Hannibal was amused to see Bedelia, dressed in traveling clothes carrying bags. Antony noticed too. 

“Going somewhere?”

Bedelia looked at Hannibal who looked back for a moment before turning to shut the door and lock it tight. 

Bedelia set her bags down and took off her hat with trembling hands. “Just preparing for a trip tomorrow,” she said, attempting to smile. “Welcome back, Mr. Dimmond.”

“It’s good to be back,” Antony grinned. 

Bedelia backed away from where Antony and Hannibal stood. “Please, enjoy yourselves. I think I could use a warm bath.” With that, she retreated into the bathroom, the door locking with a soft click behind her, and Hannibal was once again alone with Antony Dimmond. 

Antony took his time twirling into Hannibal’s space. He was very suave, eyes alight with mischief as he lightly touched Hannibal’s chest. “Shall we untwist now?”

Hannibal leaned forward and tugged on Antony’s hair. 

“We shall,” Hannibal murmured. 

Antony grinned, slightly breathless, and without wasting anymore time grabbed Hannibal’s hand and pulled him towards the direction of the bedrooms. Hannibal was distracted thinking about how Antony’s curls compared to Will’s so did not notice which bedroom the man was heading to until Antony reached for the doorknob. 

“Not this one,” Hannibal said sharply. “The second bedroom.”

Antony removed his hand from the knob of the master bedroom and Hannibal exhaled. “Ah, separate intimacies?” he nodded. “I understand.” 

_ You understand nothing,  _ Hannibal snapped in his head. But, as he pondered Antony’s words some more… he realized the man wasn’t incorrect. 

Hannibal took a calming breath and tugged Antony towards the bedroom he shared with Bedelia. Once through the door, he all but attacked the younger man by ripping his clothes off. Antony met his passion enthusiastically and in no time both men were naked. 

Hannibal pushed Antony onto the bed and massaged circles into his hips with expert fingers as he pressed their bodies together. Antony moaned at the contact and bucked his hips up into Hannibal’s hands, his arousal already evident. 

Hannibal closed his eyes, grabbed onto Antony’s hair, and willed his own excitement into existence. 

It was nice, writhing against Antony like this, feeling the familiar zing of lust course through his veins. It was nice with Bedelia, too. Hannibal always had firm control over his desire, and always used it with a specific purpose in mind. Will was the only one that challenged Hannibal’s tight control over himself. 

Hannibal pulled Antony’s hair tighter at the thought of Will and tried to focus on the attractive man beneath him. Will wasn’t here, but Antony was. He was attractive, and willing, and begging Hannibal to fuck him. 

“God, please,” Antony groaned in his deep, accented voice. “I want you.” 

“Don’t speak,” Hannibal ordered, flipping him over onto his stomach and placing one hand on his back to hold him in place while he reached for the lubricant. Antony obeyed Hannibal’s command and only gasped a little when wet fingers entered him and prepared him for what would come next. 

Hannibal’s mind was static as he quickly stretched out his partner. When he determined that Antony was adequately prepared, Hannibal lifted Antony onto his knees and pressed his face harder in the pillow before slicking himself up and sliding inside with one smooth motion. 

Hannibal heard Antony’s muffled groan into the pillow but didn’t pay any attention to him apart from gripping his hips as he thrust into him hard and fast. Sex felt good to Hannibal, and he did his best to ignore the intrusive thoughts in his mind and the persistent pain in his heart as he fucked Antony harder. 

The longer Hannibal was fucking him, the more pleasure he felt. It built and it built, until Hannibal had to reach down to grab onto Antony’s hair and feel the curls between his fingers. It was starting to feel quite good now, and Hannibal felt his balls tighten, indicating that he was close. He was breathing fast, almost as fast as he was plowing into his partner, and if he focused hard enough on his hair and not the rest of his body then he could almost pretend it was — 

“Will,” Hannibal gasped, hips stuttering as he came. 

Through the mindless haze of his orgasm, Hannibal felt Antony spasm around him and could smell his cum as it spurted onto the silk sheets. 

Hannibal immediately pulled out and collapsed on the bed next to his partner, eyes closed and trying to catch his breath. When he recovered his strength, he reached over into the nightstand to retrieve a spare cloth and went to work wiping himself and Antony clean. Antony groaned slightly at the touch, but smiled his thanks to Hannibal through a yawn. 

“Untwisting worked quite well, I’d say.” 

“Yes,” Hannibal agreed. He knew he'd have to kill Antony sooner or later, but the man was useful in other ways first. Hannibal quite liked his curls. 

Antony yawned again and slowly got up to start re-dressing. Hannibal did the same, putting on his impeccable suit. “Won’t you stay for dinner?”

“Your cooking is amazing,” Antony smiled. “But I’m afraid I already have plans.”

Hannibal tilted his head and searched his face. “Very well. You are always welcome back.”

Antony grinned. “Good to know.” 

Hannibal led him out of the bedroom and into the dining area where he noticed Bedelia lurking, but Antony stopped before heading towards the front door. He hesitated, and Hannibal looked at him curiously.

“Who is Will?” he inquired. 

Hannibal’s face immediately went dark and he felt a powerful wave of anger wash over him. He distantly heard Bedelia’s gasp of fear but his focus was entirely on the audacity of the man in front of him. Antony did not seem to notice Hannibal’s fury and thus was completely blindsided when Hannibal grabbed the object closest to him — a small bust on the table — and bashed him on the head violently. 

_ You are not worthy to speak his name, _ Hannibal snarled inwardly.  _ A cheap imitation.  _

Hannibal’s anger took a few moments to abide to a manageable level. He composed himself, set the bust back on the table, and addressed Bedelia. 

“Observe or participate?”

There was silence, during which Hannibal removed the jacket he had just put on. “What?” Bedelia whispered. 

Hannibal fixed her with his gaze and allowed some of his anger to leak into his tone. “Are you, in this very moment, observing? Or participating?”

Bedelia blinked. “Observing,” she whispered. 

“You say you’re observing, but this —” Hannibal looked down to where Antony Dimmond was making a sad attempt at crawling for the door, leaving a heavy trail of blood behind. “This is participation, Bedelia.” 

Bedelia looked at Antony with palpable fear. 

“Did you know what he would do?” Hannibal asked, moving to invade her space. “I would prefer you answer honestly.”

“I was curious,” she said quietly.

“You were curious what would happen. You were curious what Mr. Dimmond would do. What I would do.”

Bedelia nodded slightly, mouth parted in terror. 

“Did you anticipate our thoughts? Counter-thoughts? Rationalizations?” Hannibal wondered. 

“Yes,” she breathed. 

Hannibal stepped back and gestured towards Antony twitching on the floor. “Is this what you expected?”

“Yes,” she admitted, tears welling up in her eyes. 

“That’s participation.” 

By now Antony had reached the door and was reaching up towards the knob. Hannibal turned his back on Bedelia and walked over to him with purposeful rage, not hesitating at all to grip his head and wrench it back so his neck snapped with a loud crack. 

Bedelia gasped again and Hannibal returned to her. “What  _ have _ you gotten yourself into Bedelia?”

He noticed her standing close to her bags and wearing her coat, evidently not having taken the bath she said she would. She did not leave when she had the chance, but Hannibal supposed that was because she knew Hannibal would find her. 

“Shall I hang up your coat?” 

She allowed him to remove it from her shoulders, crying as she did. Hannibal hung up the coat then returned to the body on the floor. 

He expertly stripped Antony of his clothes — in a very different manner than before — then strode into the kitchen. He returned after a few moments with a large basin and equally large saw. 

“If you do not intend to observe or participate further,” Hannibal warned quietly, “I suggest you return to your bath.” 

* * *

Hannibal sat on a train bound for Palermo with a large, heavy suitcase at his feet. He stared out the window to watch the Italian countryside speed by, and he thought about Will. 

He thought about what Will was doing right then. It had been about eight months since Hannibal left him on the floor, gutted, in a pool of his and Abigail’s blood. It was enough time for a full recovery, and Hannibal wondered what Will was doing now that he was well. 

Whatever he was doing, he probably hated Hannibal. Quite right, too. Hannibal had done much to deserve his resentment, but Hannibal found he only regretted the single act of betrayal that Will did not know about. 

Sleeping with Antony had been wrong. Not wrong because it was a man, or even someone other than Will, but wrong because Hannibal had done so as an attempt to replace Will. It was a deplorable attempt, but it was an attempt nonetheless. Antony couldn’t replace Will. Nobody could replace Will. 

_ Snails aren’t the only creatures who prefer eating with company. If only that company could be Will Graham.  _

With the words of Abel Gideon ringing in his ears, it was then that Hannibal knew Will Graham owned his heart. 

Hannibal was experiencing a new feeling — guilt. His regret of sleeping with Antony was gnawing away at him, and killing him had not been enough to relieve it. Hannibal needed to do something else, something that would tell Will everything he was feeling. 

Hannibal took out of his bag a printout of the Vitruvian Man that had been given to him by a friendly tourist at the train station. He considered it, then slowly and meticulously folded it into the shape of a heart. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts? Are y'all excited for the rest of season 3??
> 
> Follow me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/Hannibalsfangs) for sneak peeks and hannibal shitposts!


	2. Aperitivo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You told him we knew,” Jack stated, after a breath. 
> 
> “I told him to leave,” Will corrected. “‘Cause I… wanted him to run.” 
> 
> Will could hear Jack pursing his lips. “Why?” 
> 
> Will closed his eyes. The truth was caught in his throat, fighting to come out, and Will didn’t have the strength to hold it back anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A few notes on the structure, if anyone is interested ~ 
> 
> In the first few episodes of season 3, the storytelling isn't linear. It works great in the show, but for my rewrite I wanted to make it linear so it's easier to follow their story - and because y'all have already experienced the nonlinear story and I wanted to do something different :) So, this second chapter actually covers parts of episode 2 and 4 (Will's point of view before going to Italy). I'm making the chapter titles episode names, so I named this one Aperitivo because it mostly covers stuff from that episode, as I said. Chapter 3 will be episode 2 (Primavera), chapter 4 will be episode 3 (Secondo), but then we get back on track with chapter 5 = episode 5 (Contorno)!
> 
> For this chapter, we get Will's POV of all those months apart from Hannibal after Mizumono. Enjoy!! :)

Will woke up. 

He didn’t think he would, and was unsure if he wanted to. The last thing he remembered was lying in a pool of blood of his own creation and closing his eyes to surrender to the darkness. Abigail was dead, Hannibal had left him, and he was all alone. 

The teacup that Hannibal had once shattered and tried so hard to repair was broken all over again, this time by Will’s own hand. 

He woke up in the hospital, realized he was alive, and was immediately hit with a whirlpool of feelings that were too jumbled to make any sense of. There was pain, so much pain that Will wasn’t sure where it all came from. There was also anger, guilt, shame, and many more emotions that Will did not have the capacity to process while hooked up to various machines. 

He wasn’t sure if he would ever be able to fully process them. 

He opened his eyes, and the first thing he saw was a generic clock on the wall. Will stared at it, worried, until the minute hand started to tick. He sighed, surrendering to the fact that he had indeed survived, and now he had to deal with everything that came with living. Was that Hannibal’s design?

“How do you feel?” an unfamiliar voice came from the left side of his bed. It was a doctor, asking a question that Will was in no way equipped to answer yet. 

“Thirsty,” he settled on. 

The doctor nodded and explained his injuries, which Will tried to listen to through the buzzing in his ears. The doctor helped Will drink some water then asked, “Feel well enough for a visitor?”

Will shrugged, uncaring, and glanced toward the door where Abigail suddenly materialized. His heart ached, knowing she was dead. He had watched Hannibal cut her throat deep, had felt her bleed out and take her last breath under his hands. She was undoubtedly dead, but Will couldn’t let her go just yet. 

He had tried to ignore his inner maelstrom of feelings, but it appeared his subconscious was not going to let him. Just looking at her was painful, and Will didn’t know if he could handle this conversation with himself. It seemed some part of him was going to try. 

The ghost of Abigail that lived inside Will walked towards him and sat on his hospital bed. 

“They told me he knew exactly how to cut me. They said it was surgical,” she said, eyes boring into his, repeating the words Will had just heard from the doctor. 

“He wanted us to live.”

Will blinked back the pain that truth brought him. Hannibal cut into him but did not intend to kill him. He wondered if that meant Hannibal cared about him, in his own fucked up way, or if he just wanted Will to suffer more. After all, life was pain. Will knew that intimately well… and now, so did Hannibal. 

_ I let you know me. See me. I gave you a rare gift… but you didn’t want it.  _

Will didn’t need to be an empath to feel the pain Hannibal had felt in that moment. Even remembering it now, he felt a deep ache in his bones. 

“He left us to die,” he whispered.

“But we didn’t,” Abigail said simply. “He was supposed to take me with him. We were all supposed to leave together. He made a place for us.”

Will clenched his eyes shut, a barrage of things he already knew but were too painful to face crashing over him. He wanted to leave with Hannibal, that night. He showed up at his house with the hope that Hannibal had already fled. All the possibilities of what could have happened if Will had done things differently were gnawing at him inside. 

_ You were supposed to leave. _

_ We couldn’t leave without you. _

“Abigail,” Will whispered, begging his subconscious to take it easy on him. He could feel tears welling up in his eyes. The self-blame and self-hatred was threatening to overpower him. 

“Why did you lie to him?” she demanded. 

Will opened his mouth, but was choked up by another wave of guilt. His reasons for lying to Hannibal, once surely righteous, now seemed meaningless. He did want Hannibal caught… but he also wanted him to be free. Will wanted Hannibal to rot in prison for all he did, but he also wanted to run away with him. 

Those conflicting desires were fighting inside him, and the resulting damage was intense, uncontrollable guilt that Will felt from both sides — the side that regretted lying to Hannibal, and the side that hated that regret. 

“The wrong thing, being the right thing to do, was… too ugly a thought,” Will said after a moment. That was the only way he could explain it to himself, although he still did not know which “right thing” or “wrong thing” he was referring to. Both choices were right, and both choices were wrong. 

Abigail considered him. “He gave you a chance to take it all back, and you just… kept lying.”

Will swallowed with difficulty. He knew he did. Will knew that Hannibal figured out his deception during their last supper together, but he wasn’t strong enough to face Hannibal's forgiveness. Will was too weak to take the chance Hannibal offered then, and now he regretted it. He regretted it so much it made him sick to think about. 

“No one had to die,” she accused. 

Will fought back tears. He  _ knew _ he was at fault. Will felt betrayed by Hannibal killing Abigail to hurt him, but more than that he felt guilty because it was  _ his _ choices that caused Hannibal to do that. Hannibal felt betrayed by Will, and wanted him to know that Abigail’s death was Will’s fault for lying and betraying him. Will knew Hannibal better than anyone, so he knew this to be true.

He wounded the monster, and the monster lashed out. Will couldn’t fault Hannibal for doing what was in his nature, but he could still be angry with him. Being angry with Hannibal was slightly better than hating himself. 

Will didn’t know himself nearly as well as he knew Hannibal, which was why his mind was throwing all this pain at him. Will couldn’t help but try to fight against it, even though he knew it was well-deserved and a natural attempt at processing the trauma he had been through. 

“It’s hard to grasp what would’ve happened, what could’ve happened…” Will said after a while, trying to convince himself. “And in some other world, did happen.”

“I’m having a hard enough time dealing with this world,” Abigail said coldly. Will almost laughed while he stared at the ceiling, because wasn’t that the truth. This whole Abigail illusion was an attempt by his subconscious to deal with what he had experienced in this world.

“I hope some of the other worlds are… easier on me,” she mused. 

“Everything that can happen, happens.” Will murmured, reassuring himself through the mind-numbing pain he was feeling from this internal confrontation. “It has to end well, and it has to end badly. It has to end every way it can… This is the way it ended for us.”

That was a theory he had stumbled across a while ago, and had resonated with. Right now, dealing with Abigail’s ghost and his soup of emotions, it seemed relevant to remember. It wasn’t healthy to dwell on what-ifs, it’s only healthy to dwell on what happened. God knows that’s enough for Will to deal with for a thousand lifetimes, in a thousand worlds. 

“We don’t have an ending,” Abigail challenged. “He didn’t give us one yet.”

Will grimaced, not liking that he had so closely tied himself to Hannibal Lecter. How Will thought about his life, and how he imagined his death... it all revolved around Hannibal. He hated that he felt such a strong bond to someone so lethal, yet so addicting at the same time. Hannibal was like a toxic drug that made Will feel understood, accepted, and free. He loved their connection, and hated himself for loving it in the same breath.

“He wants us to find him,” Abigail stressed. 

Will closed his eyes and whispered, “After everything he’s done… you’d still go to him?”

Will wasn’t sure why he asked. He already knew the answer. Maybe he just needed to hear himself admit it. 

Abigail nodded, and Will exhaled. It felt like his chest was shrinking in on itself, but maybe that was just the leftover sensation of being gutted. He could still feel Hannibal’s knife slicing through his stomach, the newly-stitched skin tingling. 

“If everything that can happen, happens… then you never really do the wrong thing,” she explained. “You’re just doing what you’re supposed to.”

Will looked away from her. She was giving voice to all his deepest thoughts and desires, forcing himself to deal with them. Wanting to go to Hannibal and excusing that desire by thinking it’s what he’s supposed to do… it’s something Will  _ wanted _ to believe with the entirety of his being. That all-encompassing need to be with Hannibal, to forgive him… the sheer power of it was what he felt so guilty about.  _ He shouldn’t want it.  _

Will sank back into his hospital bed, pushed the ghost of Abigail back inside him, and let the doctor call in Frederick Chilton, his real visitor. 

* * *

A few months later, after Will was released from the hospital, he got to work. 

He went back to his house in Wolf Trap, but being home brought him no comfort. Hannibal wasn’t there, but Will knew where he was. He mentioned that the Norman Chapel in Palermo would be the entrance to his mind palace. Will knew he would find Hannibal there, if he would find him anywhere. 

Will wasn’t quite sure what he would do once he saw Hannibal again, but he knew he had to go to him. They didn’t have an ending yet. 

It would’ve been easy to get on a flight and go to Italy as soon as he got released from the hospital, but Will wasn’t quite ready to see Hannibal then. He needed his mind to quiet down, he wanted to be as rational as possible when he saw Hannibal again because he was afraid what he would do if he wasn’t. 

So, Will did what always worked best for silencing his loud mind — he worked on a boat motor. 

He took the money he would’ve used on a first-class flight to Italy and instead bought a long-distance sailing boat. It needed a lot of fixing up, but that’s what Will liked most about it. He named it  _ NOLA _ , in a rare fit of homesickness for the place he had felt the most at home, before finding his home in Hannibal. Fixing up the boat and working on the motor gave him the mind-numbing, predictable work that he needed to quiet his mind. 

However, it didn’t always work. Sometimes, like now, Will’s mind rebelled and reminded him of memories and desires that he would rather bury deep down for the rest of his life, or until he could let them all out with Hannibal. 

Will thought about that night in Baltimore, the last night he had seen Hannibal. He had been so indecisive about what path to take, and even now he couldn’t say for sure if he decided either way. He just knew that he had chosen to warn Hannibal.

As he worked on the boat motor, Will’s mind drifted into imagining the possibility of what might have happened if he did what Hannibal wanted him to do — what he himself wanted to do, more than he cared to admit — if he had sided with Hannibal, and came running to his side like the fox did when he heard the rabbit scream.

He imagined all three of them sitting at Hannibal’s pristine dining room table, Jack at the head and Hannibal and Will on either side. The table is set with extravagant dishes, but no one is paying attention to the food. The tension is high, this night where Hannibal and Jack are out for each other and each expects Will to come to their aid. They both look at Will, but it is not their secretive glances that sway his decision either way. 

The movement of Jack’s arm going to draw his gun is what sets Will in motion. That one little action, one that Will had entirely predicted, is enough to push him to Hannibal’s side. It’s an excuse to do what he’s been trying to deny himself, and excuse  _ to be _ who he’s been denying inside. Will lunges for Jack’s arm, holding him down to prevent him from retrieving his gun, and catches the shockingly betrayed look on Jack’s face before Hannibal is there, slicing Jack’s neck with elegant precision. 

Blood sprays over Will, and he cannot stop looking at Hannibal while holding down Jack’s shaking body. The feeling he’s experiencing is one of  _ consummation.  _

The illusion of what Will wished could have been was broken by footsteps crunching over the freshly packed snow. 

He was slightly surprised that anyone had sought him out, after being fired from the FBI and just barely let off for the murder of Randall Tier. He looked over his shoulder to see Jack Crawford, and was unsure whether the twist he felt in his gut was happiness or revulsion. 

Considering what Will had just been daydreaming about, he figured it was revulsion. 

“I had hoped you would come look for me,” Jack started. “But I understand why you didn’t.”

Will didn’t say anything at first and continued working on  _ NOLA _ ’s motor. When it became clear that Jack wasn’t going to leave without a conversation, Will sighed. “What can I do for you, Jack?”

Well I’m here to, uh, make sure that you don’t contradict the official narrative.”

“Uh-huh,” Will said skeptically. 

“Well, we’re officers of the FBI, wounded in the course of heroic duty,” Jack continued. 

Will held back a snort at how incredibly untrue that entire statement was. “That’s not true for either of us,” he replied, reaching for a piston ring. 

“Well, we were supposed to go together. That’s...that’s on me. My foul. My bad,” Jack placated.

Will chose not to point out that out of all the things that went wrong that night, Jack going to Hannibal’s house without him was the last thing on his mind. 

“Not all of our choices are consciously calculated,” he said quietly. 

“No,” Jack sighed. “But our decisions are.”

Will did not like where this conversation was going and tried harder to focus on fixing the motor instead of the growing unease in his stomach. 

“You remember when you decided to call Hannibal?” Jack asked, off-hand. 

Will kept his eyes lowered on his work as he tried to answer casually. “I wasn’t decided when I called him. I just called him.”

He snuck a glance at Jack over his shoulder. “I deliberated, while the phone rang. I decided… when I heard his voice,” Will admitted softly. He could feel Jack’s stare like a target on his back, and forced his body to stay relaxed. 

“You told him we knew,” Jack stated, after a breath. 

“I told him to leave,” Will corrected. “‘Cause I… wanted him to run.” 

Will could hear Jack pursing his lips. “Why?” 

Will closed his eyes. The truth was caught in his throat, fighting to come out, and Will didn’t have the strength to hold it back anymore. 

_ Did you believe you could change me? The way I’ve changed you? _

_ I already did. _

“Because… because he — he was my friend,” Will whispered. “And because… I wanted to run away with him.” 

Jack was silent behind his back, and Will did not turn around to see his expression, sure it was one of disgust and horrified realization at his confession. He kept working on his boat motor, willing the task to numb his mind like it sometimes, but not always, did. 

Eventually, after an unknown amount of time spent in silence, Jack walked away, his footsteps crunching in the snow louder than when he had arrived. 

* * *

The day came when Will finished fixing up  _ NOLA _ , and the pain he had been ignoring for the past several months hit him with full force. 

It wasn’t just pain, either. The swirling mix of emotion he felt at the hospital was threatening to overwhelm him once again, because he no longer had anything to distract himself with. He was forced to confront his tangle of feelings surrounding Hannibal, or else risking insanity by continuing to ignore them. Will hated addressing his feelings, but he hated feeling crazy even more. Hannibal had helped him realize that. 

The anger, guilt, and pain seemed to be the strongest, so Will tackled those feelings first. 

He felt guilty for deceiving Hannibal. Will had taken Hannibal’s deepest desires and used them to trap him, and his last-minute phone call of warning was not enough of an apology. Will unquestionably felt guilty about tricking Hannibal, and that guilt fed into even more guilt because he wasn’t  _ supposed  _ to feel guilty about trying to catch the most dangerous serial killer in modern American history. 

The Chesapeake Ripper did not deserve Will’s care or guilt, only his anger and his hate. Hannibal had lied to him, manipulated him, framed him for murder, gaslit him, slept with Alana, and killed Beverly. Will was still upset about those things, but at the same time it was like he didn’t care about them at all. He just felt so  _ guilty _ about betraying Hannibal, and that made him sick with shame.

Will was also sick with anger, the kind that made his teeth gnash and his hands shake. He had many reasons to feel angry, but the one reason he kept replaying over and over in his mind was Hannibal’s decision to hurt Abigail to hurt him. Will felt furious at Hannibal for killing Abigail. 

She was not some toy for Hannibal to use to garner a reaction from Will, although that’s exactly what she ended up being. Twice, Hannibal had made Will mourn her death. Will hated that Hannibal used their surrogate daughter like that. Abigail deserved her own life, and Hannibal had taken that life and snuffed it out, all to make Will feel pain.

It did make Will feel pain. It felt like his heart was being ripped out of his chest as he lay on Hannibal’s floor, holding Abigail as she died. He still remembered that excruciating pain, every time he remembered the scene or when Abigail’s ghost confronted him with his inner demons. He did feel pain, but he felt anger at Hannibal for causing that pain as well.

The anger and the terrible guilt were constantly battling for dominance over one another inside Will, but he knew that the pain held dominion over both. The pain was a constant reminder of everything he had been through, following him everywhere like an inescapable shadow. 

There was only one place he thought to go that might make the pain recede, if only for a little while. Recede... or intensify. With how conflicted Will was feeling about everything, it would probably be both. But both happening was better than nothing changing. Will could feel himself itching to take  _ NOLA _ out on the open ocean and towards Hannibal, but he still had to work through some things before he allowed himself to do that. 

Hannibal’s house was empty and cold, long devoid of any physical traces of the crimes committed there or the cleaners that scrubbed those crimes away. Will entered through the unlocked front door, and his feet carried him straight to where he had last seen his family. 

The kitchen seemed bigger without all the furniture and appliances. Will could imagine how it was 6 months ago, bright and full of activity. He always enjoyed watching Hannibal cook, or more accurately, he enjoyed watching Hannibal enjoy something. It was one of those rare moments when Hannibal didn’t completely hide himself from others. 

_ I let you know me. See me.  _

Will gave a soft, painful sound and slid against the cabinet to sit on the floor, in the exact same spot Hannibal had dropped him after gutting him. The memories of that night were starting to come back, playing in his mind like the tearful scene in a romance movie. The comparison was ridiculous, but it was the only thing that Will could think of that even came close to mimicking how he was feeling in that kitchen. 

“What did you think would happen, when you came here that night?” Abigail’s voice came, cutting off his disordered thinking. 

Will looked to his left and saw her sitting there against the cabinet with him. She looked different than she did at the hospital. Then, she looked alive, a reflection of what Will was feeling inside. Now, she was still a reflection of him, but her appearance was exactly the same as when she died in this room, with the same clothes and blood smeared on her face. 

Will sighed, accepting what his subconscious was trying to do. The best way to work through all the pain he was feeling was diving straight into it. After all, why else would he choose to come here, the place where everything in his life fell apart? 

“I don’t know what I thought,” Will answered. “I hoped that I wouldn't find him here. I hoped I would show up after he’d gone, and deal with the aftermath.” 

“He’d never let you off that easy,” Abigail argued. “He always wanted to push you into impossible situations, see what you’d do. You knew that.”

“I knew that.” Will repeated, closing his eyes.

“Since you knew that, what did you think would happen?” Abigail insisted. 

Will was silent for a moment before he took a shuddering breath. “I thought… I thought I’d have to choose, between him and Jack. I was scared of the choice I would make.” 

Abigail nodded, pleased that he’d admitted it. “Except, he removed that choice from you. Jack was already bleeding out when you got here.”

“He thought I had already made my choice,” Will whispered.

“He felt betrayed,” Abigail noted. “Rightfully so.” 

“Rightfully so,” Will murmured, another wave of guilt rushing through him. 

Abigail tilted her head, so much like Hannibal that Will felt a stab of pain at the sight. “When you saw me, and you saw him, what do you feel?”

“A flood of happiness followed immediately by a flood of sadness,” Will replied, eyes far away. “I was happy that you were alive, grateful to him that he kept you alive, but then sad because he was still here.”

“He had not left when you warned him,” Abigail finished. “You felt sad about that.”

“He was supposed to leave,” Will whispered.

“We couldn’t leave without you,” she reminded him. “What would you have done, if he had left?”

Will sighed, tilting his head back to rest on the cabinet behind him. “I thought I was done thinking about what-ifs.” 

“Maybe you are,” she replied. “But I’m not.” 

Will closed his eyes again and thought of his words to Jack.  _ Because I wanted to run away with him.  _

“I suppose,” he said, after a pause, “that I would have followed him.”

She nods in approval. “He held your face right before he stabbed you. Why did you let him?”

“I didn’t expect him to stab me,” Will grumbled. 

Abigail grinned. “What did you expect him to do?”

Will considered her question, grateful for its directness distracting him from all the other pain of that night. He remembered meeting Hannibal’s gaze with wide, vulnerable eyes. What he saw in Hannibal’s eyes was a complicated mess of betrayal, anguish, violence, and gentleness. It’s a mixture he often felt from Hannibal non-directly, but seeing it emulate from his eyes froze Will in place. 

With his eyes still closed, he thought about how it felt when Hannibal cupped his face. He didn’t grab it, or tug on his hair. Instead, his touch was gentle, too gentle for an enemy. Too gentle, even, for a friend. 

“I expected him to kiss me,” Will whispered, giving voice to something he’d pushed deep down. 

Abigail, being his other self, was immensely satisfied at his confession. It was her job to make his repressed thoughts and emotions into conscious ones, but Will did not like this self-administered therapy. 

“Did you want him to kiss you?” she pushed. 

That was something that Will was definitely not ready to explore, no matter what certain parts of himself thought. He quickly changed the subject. “You were so afraid of me, that last time I saw you… Before the last time I saw you…”

“Your brain was on fire,” Abigail reminded him. “It’s only natural that I was scared of you. You were slipping out of reality.”

Will scoffed quietly. More like Hannibal was pulling reality out from under him.

Suddenly, he was distracted from their conversation by the dull sound of a wheelchair rolling across hardwood floors. Will took a deep breath and didn’t bother to hide his pained expression as his former friend rolled into the kitchen. 

“What are you doing here?” Will inquired with some heat, not bothering to turn his head to look at her. 

“I guess I’m looking for you,” Alana said quietly. 

“That’s a good guess,” Will replied. 

“What are you doing here?” Alana asked in return. Will held back his eye-roll at how genuinely confused she sounded. 

“Mm, visiting old friends.” 

Will felt Alana’s gaze leave him and scan the kitchen. “You’re not tempted to forget?”

“No, no. I don’t want to forget,” Will said, still staring blankly into the dark, open space of the kitchen before him. “I’m building rooms in my memory palace for all my friends.”

“Friendship with Hannibal is blackmail, elevated to the level of love,” Alana mused. 

Will swallowed. “A mutually unspoken pact to ignore the worst in one another in order to continue enjoying the best.”

He could feel Alana looking at him again. “After everything he’s done… can you still ignore the worst in him?”

Will closed his eyes for a moment at the pain he felt stabbing into him from her question. Isn’t that exactly what he came here to discover? 

“I came here to be alone, Alana,” he warned. Will finally turned his head to look at Alana for the first time in their entire conversation. She looked different, more hardened. Will wondered if he looked the same. “If you wouldn’t mind…” 

She wheeled away without another word and Will turned back to smile at Abigail. She gave him a smile in return, and the two of them sat there in silence for several more minutes, contemplating the night that everything fell apart. 

* * *

A few weeks later, on a chilly winter day, Will returned home from walking his dogs and had a voicemail from Alana. 

“Bella died, Will,” Alana’s sad voice crackled over the phone speakers. “The funeral is Saturday from 10 to 1.” 

It wasn’t surprising news, but Will still felt a surge of pity for Jack. No matter how fragmented their friendship was, Jack was still the closest thing to a friend Will had. He knew Jack loved his wife, and through his empathy also knew that living without one’s other half was a flawed existence.

Well, maybe he didn’t know that entirely from his empathy. Will felt Hannibal’s absence like a part of his soul was carved out and flayed.

He put on his best suit on the day of the funeral, and desperately tried to push any grief for Hannibal out of his mind. He was going to mourn Bella, and mourning anyone else would just be disrespectful. 

Of course, Will had never been all that respectful. 

When he walked into the church, he was surprised to see the pews empty save for Jack sitting in the first one.  _ Front row seat _ , Will’s mind supplied unhelpfully. 

He slid into the pew behind him and listened as Jack poured out his grief. 

“I hope that she’s somewhere today, Jack,” Will said quietly. “And that she’s comfortable.” 

“I hope she can see it in my heart. She had to die on me. I knew it was coming, and it still smarts.” Jack collected himself and sighed. “I know what’s coming for you, Will.”

Will furrowed his brows slightly, but when Jack stood and handed him an envelope with familiar, swooping handwriting before walking out of the church, Will knew what he meant. 

Hannibal’s letter was respectful, or as respectful as it could possibly be coming from a serial killer who stabbed the recipient. Will ran his fingers over the dried ink on the expensive paper and imagined Hannibal writing. He would sit at a desk, elegantly hunched over as his old-fashioned pen scratched the paper.

Hannibal had written a quote from John Donne, one that made Will swallow dryly. 

_ O wrangling schools, that search what fire… Shall burn this world, had none the wit.  _

Will closed his eyes, breathed once, and tucked the letter into his coat pocket before walking out of the funeral, trying to leave his grief where grief belonged.

* * *

When Will could no longer control his longing with talks with Abigail’s ghost, he knew it was time. He had exhausted all his excuses, and knew what he had to do. 

He packed up  _ NOLA _ , texted Alana about the dogs, and drove to the coast. He needed a marina with access to the open sea, and had found the address of a perfect one months ago, just waiting for him. It didn’t have to wait any longer, and neither did he. 

He hadn’t sailed in years, but the skills were ingrained in his muscle memory. He untethered from the dock, hoisted the sails, pointed the boat into the direction of the wind, and set off into the open water. The wind was fierce that day, and Will was finally able to breathe through all the emotions suffocating him. 

All his feelings about Hannibal existed in a swirling tempest that was too powerful for Will to consciously control, but he was sailing through the storm like he was sailing across the sea — with determination, impulsivity, and no clear plan. There was only the need to go forward, towards Hannibal. 

Will didn’t know what was going to happen once he found him. He didn’t know what he was going to do. Will was just as likely to kill Hannibal as he was to forgive him. 

_ I forgive you, Will. Will you forgive me? _

Will inhaled, tasting the salt of the ocean on his tongue and the cool breeze on his face. Whatever awaited him in Palermo, Will was ready for it. 

He was ready to see Hannibal again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did y'all like Will's POV as much as Hannibal's?
> 
> Thanks for reading :)


	3. Primavera

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There, in the center of the mosaic aisle in front of the altar, was the image of a skeletal torso. Will stared at it and heard Hannibal’s voice in his mind. _A skull, engraven on the floor._
> 
> The skeleton was tightly holding a heart in its hands, but its face was turned away. 
> 
> Will’s own heart felt heavy. “Nothing would thrill Hannibal more than to see this roof collapse mid-Mass, packed pews, choir singing… He would just love it.”
> 
> Will sighed and turned his gaze from the skull on the floor up to the image of Jesus on the domed ceiling. “And he thinks... God would love it too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, Will gets to Italy!! This is one of my favorite episodes from the show and it was so fun to write :) Hope y'all enjoy!!

Will walked into the Norman Chapel in Palermo and was immediately seized with awe.

He docked in Sicily at about three in the afternoon, and as soon as he stepped foot on land he asked the locals for directions to the  _ Cappella.  _ After all these long months he was so close, and he couldn’t focus on anything except how to get to the church Hannibal had specifically mentioned to him. And now, about half an hour after he arrived in Palermo - about eight months after being gutted and abandoned — he was here. 

Will had never been particularly religious; even growing up, his father was not a God-fearing man. He thought of religion abstractly, and only stepped foot in a church for the occasional funeral.

He had never seen a church like this before. 

It wasn’t particularly big, but every inch of the walls, flooring, and ceiling were beautifully decorated in the Byzantine style. Will’s eyes flitted around to take in all of the different but equally ornate designs; the floor was mostly mosaic, the ceiling and walls painted to depict scenes of saints, angels, and God. It was the most artistic church Will had ever been to, and he felt an appreciation for the ancient architecture a lot more than an appreciation for any kind of spiritual power.

It was just the type of place Hannibal would love, and Will’s heart ached by how close he felt to the man here. 

“Even in an enlightened world,” he said softly, looking at the crowd of people around him, “we come here to feel closer to God.” 

“Do you feel closer to God?” Abigail asked. His mind had dressed her in an outfit he had never seen her wear before, a trick played by his subconscious to give him the comforting illusion of companionship in a foreign land. 

Will made his way towards the front altar, searching for something specific. “God’s not who I came here to find.”

There was silence as he searched, the respectful hush for others’ prayers allowing Will space to think. Hannibal told him this place was the foyer of his mind. Will wondered when he first came here. Did he feel the sacred power of this place like so many others, or did he simply come to admire the art? Did he sit in the pews, day after day, looking up at the beautiful Chapel ceiling and wishing it would crack?

Will knew Hannibal thought about God often, pondering ways in which he could defy Him with similar traits. It was awfully arrogant, but Will understood the quiet sense of power and control God had that would be attractive to Hannibal. They were attractive to the Devil, too. 

“Do you believe in God?” Abigail questioned, pulling Will out of his thoughts. 

“What I believe is closer to science fiction than anything in the Bible,” he replied. 

“We all know it, but nobody ever says that G-dash-D won’t do a G-dash-D damned thing to answer anybody’s prayers.” 

Will nodded and said critically, “God can’t save any of us, because it’s inelegant. Elegance is more important than suffering. That’s his design.”

Abigail smirked. “You talking about God or Hannibal?”

Will rolled his eyes. “Hannibal’s not God. Wouldn’t have any fun being God.  _ Defying _ God, that’s his idea of a good time.” So much like the Devil, indeed. 

Will looked down and stopped moving. There, in the center of the mosaic aisle in front of the altar, was the image of a skeletal torso. Will stared at it and heard Hannibal’s voice in his mind.  _ A skull, engraven on the floor.  _

The skeleton was tightly holding a heart in its hands, but its face was turned away. 

Will’s own heart felt heavy. “Nothing would thrill Hannibal more than to see this roof collapse mid-Mass, packed pews, choir singing… He would just love it.”

Will sighed and turned his gaze from the skull on the floor up to the image of Jesus on the domed ceiling. “And he thinks... God would love it too.”

As Will looked, a crack appeared across the top of the ceiling. His eyes widened and he reached out to catch the dust falling from above. Although he succeeded, and could see dust covering his hand, he could not feel it.

Will’s imagination had always been powerful, but he was a little surprised that Hannibal’s visions were starting to become his own. Then again, as Will raised his head to look upon the fake crack in the Chapel ceiling, he supposed he wasn’t surprised at all. 

* * *

Will was in Palermo for two weeks before a body appeared in the Norman Chapel. 

He discovered this on his daily walk to the church in the mid-morning hours, when he found  _ polizia _ swarming the place and tourists dejectedly turning away. Will’s heart skipped a beat — it must be Hannibal. 

He slipped inside and was disappointed to see a screen obstructing the view of the crime scene. People were in protective gear taking pictures of whatever macabre piece of art Hannibal had left him, and Will grew anxious. 

“Is it him?” Abigail urged. 

_ I don’t know, _ Will wanted to snap.  _ I hope it is, but I can’t know for sure. Not yet. I need to  _ see.

_ “Per favore, signore _ ,” a uniformed police officer called out to Will.  _ “È proibito qui. La Cappella è chiusa.” _

Will didn’t take his eyes off the shielded display, straining to see through the thin white fabric. He could just make out an oval shadow, perched on some sort of easel. “I’m sorry, I don’t speak—”

“The Chapel is closed,” the guy repeated in English, firmly. 

Will sighed out his frustration but before he could bite out a reply or leave, another police officer pointed to him and said something in rapid Italian.

“What did he say?” Will asked the first officer. If he looked beneath the bottom of the screen, he could just make out a small pool of blood gathering around the legs of the easel. 

“He said he wants to talk to you.” 

Will finally tore his gaze from the crime scene barrier and looked at the second man. He wasn’t uniformed like the first guy but he was wearing blue surgical gloves; a detective, then. He must be the man in charge of the investigation. If Will went with him, talked with him, he would be able to extract some answers about the body. Maybe he would even be allowed to see some crime scene photos. 

He would be able to find out if Hannibal had left him something. 

Will nodded his agreement and the detective barked some orders to the uniformed officer.

“I’m taking you back to the station,” he explained, shepherding Will out of the church. “You will talk there.”

He went willingly, at this point used to being herded around by law enforcement. Abigail disappeared when Will walked into the Palermo police station, and he was grateful. He didn’t need his attention split while he tried to manipulate the detective into letting him see the crime scene photos. 

The officer deposited him on a bench in clear view of the manned front desk, obviously making sure Will wouldn’t run when given the chance. He wouldn’t, and Will didn’t know how to feel about being treated as a suspect. It wasn’t unjustified, but it wasn’t entirely accurate either. 

There was another man on his bench but Will ignored him for now, instead turning his attention to the station itself. It was a massive building with an open floor plan, antique marble columns separating each section of desks. People were everywhere; police officers, suspects in handcuffs, and citizens with whatever business they had with the law. It reminded Will of the criminal district court in New Orleans, and he pushed the association away quickly. That was another lifetime, a different man. 

Will studied the marble floors and columns in more detail, and thought Hannibal would like this place. He’d probably like it even more because it was a police station. He’d find it amusing. 

_ “Signor  _ Graham,” the guy on his bench stated, getting Will’s attention. “Chief Investigator Rinaldo Pazzi,  _ Questura di Firenze _ .”

_ Firenze? _ Will inhaled evenly at the introduction and kept his eyes trained forward.

“You’re a long way from Florence,” Will noted apathetically. 

“You’re a long way from Baltimore,” Pazzi countered. 

Will turned to fix a suspicious look at the investigator. Who was this guy, and how did he know who Will was? Why was he in Palermo when he’s from Florence? Will got a sinking feeling in his stomach. 

“I read everything I can find on FBI profiling methods,” Pazzi explained. “I read all about your incarceration.”

Will looked away. “Keep reading. I was acquitted.”

Pazzi stared at him for a beat, then leaned on the bench towards Will’s space. “You come to Palermo and soon — very soon — a body is discovered. The priest at the  _ Cappella dei Normanni _ said you have been spending a lot of time there.”

Will leaned towards Pazzi like he was letting him in on a secret and whispered, “I’ve been praying.”

Pazzi smiled slightly. “There is some comfort in prayer,” he mused. “It leaves you with the distinct feeling you’re not alone.”

They locked eyes and Will saw straight through the other man. He knew about Will’s history at the FBI, so he also knew about his history with Hannibal. He inferred that wherever Will would be, Hannibal would be also. A fair guess, Will supposed. He hoped it was Hannibal that left the corpse at the Chapel, as this man seemed to believe. But why was a Florence detective so interested in Hannibal Lecter?

“ _ Signore _ .” The detective from the Chapel appeared behind Pazzi and motioned at Will.  _ “Vieni con me.” _

Will rose from the bench and followed after him, pausing to glance back at Pazzi. 

“ _ Ciao _ ,” the inspector murmured.

Will studied him for a moment, then walked away. 

* * *

An hour later, Will made his way down the stairs of the police station. The conversation with the detective had not been fruitful, for both Will or the detective. They traded questions like lawyers, neither one of them giving anything away but both poking at the other’s mind. Will tried his best to get access to the pictures and information, but the detective was like a brick wall. 

Frustrated at his wasted opportunity, Will bounded down the steps and was happy to see Abigail waiting for him at the bottom. He could use some time to brainstorm ideas about how to gain access to the crime scene. His subconscious was as anxious as he was to determine if it was indeed Hannibal who left the body in the Chapel. 

Suddenly, a figure appeared from the left and entered Will’s field of vision. He groaned inwardly, not wanting to speak with Inspector Pazzi again. 

“Is Will Graham here because of the body at the  _ Cappella _ ,” Pazzi started, “Or is the body here because of Will Graham?” 

Will sighed and answered Pazzi’s question with one of his own. Maybe this man would be less of a brick wall and more of a thorny bush. 

“Why are you here?” 

“I’m like you,” Pazzi responded. “I do what you do. We share the gift of imagination.”

Will considered that. Sometimes it felt like nobody in the world could understand what it was like to think the way he did, but this man said he did. Will didn’t entirely trust him, but the thought was nice. Except, his imagination didn’t feel like a gift as much as it felt like a curse. 

“I’ve got the scars of a man who grabbed his ‘gift’ by the blade,” Will grumbled. 

“You grabbed the wrong end.”

Will laughed darkly and moved towards the exit. More like the wrong end got thrust inside his stomach. 

“Those moments when the connection is made?” Pazzi sighed. “That is my keenest pleasure.”

Will hesitated in front of the door. “Knowing.”

“Knowing,” Pazzi nodded. “Not feeling, not thinking.”

Will used to think those moments were his worst nightmare, but now… it was just as Pazzi said. Knowing felt good. It felt powerful. 

“You know who murdered that man and left him in the  _ Cappella Palatina _ ,” Pazzi stated calmly. It wasn’t a question. 

Will turned around. “Don’t you know?” 

Wasn’t that why Pazzi was here? He suspected it was Hannibal who left the corpse, just like Will. Will wanted to know just how he came to that conclusion. How Pazzi knew Hannibal. 

Pazzi nodded and walked closer to Will. “I met him, 20 years ago.  _ Il Mostro _ , the monster of Florence. It was his custom to arrange his victims like a beautiful painting.”

Will inhaled imperceptibly. That sounded exactly like Hannibal. Making art out of the unworthy, elevating their rudeness to beauty. It was him. 

“ _ Il Mostro _ created images… that stayed in my mind,” Pazzi exhaled. Will watched him with sharp eyes until his gaze was drawn to pictures the inspector produced out of a yellow envelope. 

“20 years ago, I was dwelling on a couple found slain in the bed of a pickup truck in Impruneta.” He handed Will a photo of the crime scene. “Bodies placed, garlanded with flowers…”

Will analyzed Hannibal’s work. It looked familiar. “Like a… Botticelli.” 

“Exactly like a Botticelli,” Pazzi stressed. “His painting  _ Primavera  _ still hangs in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, just as it did 20 years ago. The garlanded nymph on the right, the flowers streaming from her mouth, match.”

Will stared at the photograph of the original Botticelli and imagined it hanging on a wall of dark brown wood. 

“The Uffizi Gallery,” he asserted. “That’s where you met  _ il Mostro _ .” Again, it wasn’t a question. 

Pazzi looked grim. “That’s where I met this man.”

He held up a black-and-white headshot of a young man that was obviously Hannibal. Will took it, brought it close, and devoured it with his eyes. 

Hannibal had the same hairstyle. Straight, dark hair that was perhaps a tad more thick in the photograph than Will remembered. His face was less lined, smooth with youth in a way that made his strong cheekbones pop out. His eyes, black and appraising, were exactly the same. So were his full lips. 

“The monster of Florence,” Pazzi announced. 

Will wasn’t surprised that Hannibal had made a name for himself in Italy as a young man before coming to America. He remembered him talking about living in a boarding school in Paris as a boy, after both his parents and his sister were killed. Hannibal had never told him any details, and Will had never pried. He only found out where Hannibal had grown up while in the hospital watching his segment on FBI’s Most Wanted. Hannibal’s face was plastered on every major news source across the country for weeks after his unmasking.

Will knew the facts. Hannibal Lecter, born in the Aukštaitija region of Lithuania, technically a count. He still owned land in Aukštaitija, his family’s mansion presumably. He studied medicine in Paris, then attended his residency at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. He never left. 

The facts were there, but the reality of Hannibal’s life was still hidden from Will. He didn’t know that he had lived in Florence for a time, or was the apparently infamous  _ il Mostro _ . Will hated being faced with the reality that he didn’t know Hannibal as well as he thought he did. He wanted to know what Hannibal experienced, and where he lived it. He wanted to walk where he walked, and see what he saw.

He looked upon the photo of a young Hannibal, and imagined him sitting in front of the  _ Primavera _ in the Uffizi Gallery. He would have sketched it, multiple times to get the details right so he could recreate them with better materials.

“To find the inspiration  _ il Mostro _ used was a triumph,” Pazzi recalled with a distant look. “I went to the Uffizi and stood before the original  _ Primavera _ day after day and most days.... I’d see a young Lithuanian man as transfixed by the Botticelli as I was — as transfixed as I imagined _ il Mostro _ would be.”

Will could see it. Hannibal’s young, lithe body sat respectfully in front of the painting, diligently drawing the images over and over again. He saw it so clearly he wanted to reach out and touch, but Hannibal was turned with his back to Will. 

“And every day I saw him,” Pazzi continued, “he would recreate the  _ Primavera _ in pencil, just as he did in flesh.”

Will closed his eyes a long moment before opening them again and handing Pazzi the picture of Hannibal back. “He likes making art.” 

“Yes he does,” the investigator acknowledged. “Would you like to see his latest piece?” 

Will’s eyes snapped up. “You have pictures?” 

“Pictures, and more. I can get you into the  _ Cappella _ .”

Will had been planning to go back and sneak in anyway, but having legal access was better. And those pictures were what he really wanted. He desperately needed to  _ see.  _

“Lead the way,” Will said. 

* * *

The Norman Chapel was just as beautiful at night as it was during the day, even moreso. The candlelight fell upon the frescos like moonlight, giving the entire church an otherworldly feel.

All the pews were put away because of the crime scene, but the crime scene was now gone as well. _ La polizia _ worked fast, it seemed, and nothing remained of the body but a few evidence markers and crime scene tape. 

“You said you had photos?” Will asked as they walked in. Pazzi stopped and turned around in front of him, placing them both in the center of the Chapel. 

“Signor Graham, I cannot stress the… magnitude of that moment I had, in front of the Primavera,” he responded. “I knew. It was the best moment of my life, a moment of epiphany — that made me famous, and then ruined me.”

Will tilted his head. Inspector Pazzi was not the bright, young, respected detective he once was. He was now older, hardened, and less trusted by his peers. Will couldn’t help but think about how his path compared to Hannibal’s. They both started out their careers together, long ago, but those careers couldn’t have had more different paths. Hannibal was always well-respected and retained his strength as he aged. He was certainly still fit, but…

He had chosen to unmask himself and lose all respect from his peers, for Will. 

_ You were supposed to leave.  _

_ We couldn’t leave without you.  _

Will took a deep breath and tried to focus back on what Pazzi was saying. “In haste and the heat of ambition, the  _ Questura _ nearly destroyed the young man’s home trying to find evidence.”

Will walked past Pazzi towards the evidence markers on the floor, right on top of the engraved skull in the mosaic. “He doesn’t leave evidence.”

“No, he doesn’t.”

“He eats it,” Will continued, ducking under the crime scene tape to get a closer look at where the corpse left by Hannibal once rested. 

“Another man — not an innocent man, but innocent of those crimes — was a dream suspect,” Pazzi informed him. Will sat on the steps of the altar, in front of the skull. 

“He was convicted on no evidence, except his character,” Pazzi finished. 

Will rested his forearms on his knees. “Blame has a habit of not sticking to Hannibal Lecter.”

“It has a habit of sticking to you,” Pazzi pointed out, before finally handing Will the envelope of crime scene photos and walking away. In that moment, Will was grateful that Pazzi knew who he was and how he did what he did. He hated explaining his process to people. 

Will slid the photographs out of the envelope and inhaled sharply. The body didn’t look like a body at all — it looked like a heart. A human heart, anatomically correct in every way. 

Will closed his eyes, heard the beat of his own heart, and imagined the scene. 

He imagined the heart standing alone, right on top of the engraved skull, as intended. Seeing it now, Will knows this was Hannibal’s work, without a doubt. He left this mutilated corpse for Will, right where he said he would. 

“I splintered every bone,” Will started, “fractured them. Dynamically. Made you malleable.” 

Just like Hannibal did to Will, and arguably — just what Will did to Hannibal. 

_ Did you believe you could change me? Like I changed you? _

_ I already did.  _

Will circled the heart, focusing on the current crime. “I skinned you, bent you, twisted you, and trimmed you. Head, hands, arms and legs.” He let out a breathy laugh. “A topiary.” 

Will stepped closer to the heart and raised a shaking hand to touch it. 

“A valentine written on a broken man,” he whispered. 

The sound of a heart beating grew louder, until Will realized it was coming from inside the man-made heart and not his own. He stepped back, letting his hand fall away, as the heart unfolded into the shape of a skinned, and trimmed, figure. 

Out of the holes that once connected to hands and feet grew four hooves. The grotesque, stag-made heart in Will’s mind clopped its way towards him, growing familiar shapes out of the hole where the head once was. The shapes blossomed into antlers; huge, curling antlers.

It was a horrid creature, created when Hannibal’s valentine turned into a nightmare.

“Will?”

Abigail’s voice pulled him out of the illusion with a loud gasp. Will breathed heavily and blinked, scattering the hellish images in his mind. He scrubbed his face in an effort to compose himself and laughed breathlessly. 

“I do feel closer to Hannibal here.” 

It was the entire reason why he went to Palermo in the first place, and he felt a terrified kind of joy at getting what he wanted. Well, not quite what he wanted. He felt close to Hannibal, but that wasn’t the same thing as being  _ with _ Hannibal. 

Will laughed again, an unhinged sound. “God only knows where I’d be without him.” 

He thought back to what he’d just imagined, the images he saw from the crime scene photos. It was Hannibal, there was no doubt. He should be happy at the confirmation (should he be happy about a serial killer leaving him a calling card?) but all he could focus on was the incredible  _ pain _ that resonated from his tableau. 

“He left us his…” Will took another deep breath, “His broken heart.”

He looked up at Abigail with haunted eyes full of first- and second-hand pain. She looked confused more than anything, once again leaving Will all the agonizing feelings and taking all the rationality. 

“How did he know we were here?”

“He didn’t,” Will exhaled. “But he knew we would come.”

Will had never felt so seen by anybody as he did by Hannibal. It used to bother him, that his strongest bond was with a cannibalistic serial killer. It still did a bit, but he came to accept it. They understand and accept each other, and that was what really mattered. 

“He misses us,” Abigail realized softly. 

It’s strange to consider, but the longer Will thought about it, the more honest her words seemed. 

“Hannibal follows several trains of thoughts at once without distraction from any,” Will allowed slowly. “One of the trains… is always for his own amusement.”

Will was intimately familiar with this way of thinking. After all, it was how his thoughts worked. Constantly thinking multiple things at once, all those trains crashing into one another in conflict, never knowing which one is going to end up on top. Hannibal’s thought process was more ordered than Will’s, but it was still just as complicated. 

“He’s playing with us,” Abigail ventured. 

“Always,” Will whispered. 

He peered up at Abigail and tried to control his voice, suddenly feeling choked up. “You still want to go with him?”

She looked at him for a second before moving to sit next to him on the altar steps.

“Yes,” she said simply, confirming what Will already felt on the inside. 

After everything Hannibal’s done, Will still wanted to go with him. Even though he’s hurt Will horribly, and taunted him, and stabbed him — Will wanted to be with Hannibal. 

It was painful to admit, and it made Will afraid of himself. 

“He gave you back to me,” he whispered. “Then he took you away. It’s Lucy and the football, he just keeps pulling you away.” 

Will held back tears as he said it, grieving for Abigail’s loss and ashamed that not even Abigail’s death was enough for Will to turn away from Hannibal. 

Abigail sighed, and Will pushed that line of thinking away. It hurt too much. 

“What if no one died?” Will questioned softly. “What if… What if we all left together? Like we were supposed to, after he served the lamb.”

It was a nice dream, one of Will’s favorite “what-ifs” to explore when he couldn’t cope with reality any longer. They would have all left, together, as a family. The only family Will had ever felt a real connection to. 

“Where would we have gone?” he wondered, gazing into the shadows of the old Chapel. 

He felt Abigail’s pitying concern radiate beside him. “In some other world?”

“In some other world,” Will agreed sadly, turning to look at her again. 

“He said he made a place for us,” she repeated, smiling. 

It was Will’s turn to feel a surge of pity. “A place was made for you, Abigail. In this world.”

He took a shuddering breath and dropped his eyes to her collarbone, trying to hold back tears. “It was the only place I could make for you.”

She smiled at him sadly, also holding back the tears he felt welling up in his eyes. As Will looked at her, a thin line appeared across her throat and blood spurted out. Her wave of blood unlocked another wave of grief inside Will, and he fought off tears as his mind replayed the memories of when he watched her die, the two of them laying in that great pool of their shared blood on Hannibal’s kitchen floor. 

The next moment she disappeared, and Will was left alone with his grief. 

He doesn’t know how long he sat on those church steps, trying to rein in the flood of acute pain. At some point he laid down, stretching out and staring up at the ornate ceiling of the  _ Cappella. _ He thought about many things, but all his thoughts centered around Hannibal. 

He was fished out of his mind by Pazzi’s voice. “Are you… praying?”

Will kept his eyes trained on the depiction of God above him. “Hannibal doesn’t pray. But he believes in God — intimately.” 

“I wasn’t asking Hannibal Lecter,” Pazzi responded. He walked up to stand beside where Will was sprawled out. 

“I think my prayers would feel constricted by the saints and apostles and Jesus Pantocrator,” Will reflected. 

He got to his feet. “How do your prayers feel?”

Pazzi considered his answer. “I hope my prayers escaped, flown from here to the open sky, and God.”

“Praying you catch him?” Will inquired. “You should be praying he doesn’t capture you.”

Pazzi turned to face him. “I didn’t head the  _ Questura di Firenze _ for nothing.”

Will hummed and glanced at a gated stairwell near him, to the right side of the sanctuary. “You couldn’t catch him when he was just a kid, what makes you think you’re gonna catch him now?”

Pazzi smiled. “You.” 

Will walked over to the stairwell. “What makes you think I  _ want _ to catch him?”

The stairs led down to a large door, candles lit on either side to illuminate the subterranean space with a warm glow. 

“ _ Signor _ Graham,” Pazzi murmured from behind him. He said something more in Italian, but Will tuned him out to stare intently at the door leading into the bowels of the ancient church. As he stared, his heart beat faster, and a pool of blood started to seep out under the door. 

“If you could possibly be content,” Will whispered in warning, “I would suggest you let  _ il Mostro _ go.”

“I can’t do that any more than you can.”

“He’s gonna kill you, you know.” Will turned to look at him. “I’m usually right about these things.”

“He let you know him. He sent you his heart,” Pazzi emphasized. “Where has he gone now?”

Will smiled. “He hasn’t gone anywhere. He’s still here.”

* * *

The catacombs were dark, with only the occasional soft light of a few small candles illuminating the shadows within. Dirt muffled Will’s footsteps as he made his way through the maze beneath the church, trying to find his way to Hannibal. 

So far, Will only came across the bones of the dead. 

He made his way through the passageways slowly, careful to listen for the slightest sounds. Will didn’t expect Hannibal to come running up to him, although it would be gratifying. No, he would have to work to find his monster. 

He could already hear soft, unhurried footsteps. 

“Hannibal!” Will called, his voice echoing in the dark catacombs. 

The footsteps paused; but there was no response, and after a breath Will continued his search. 

He found Inspector Pazzi in a small alcove with the skeletons of a few early monks. The man was on edge, his gun shaking in his hands where he held it out in front of him. 

“You shouldn’t be down here,” Will warned. 

Pazzi spun around with a gasp, saw Will, and lowered his gun with a smile. “I’m not alone. I’m with you.”

Will let out a dry laugh and smiled slightly. “You don’t know whose side I’m on.” 

Pazzi stared at him, cautious. “What are you going to do when you find him? Your  _ il Mostro _ ?”

Will stared him down a moment before breaking their gaze and searching the tunnels branching out around him, intimately aware that Hannibal could probably hear every word he said. 

“I’m… I’m curious about that myself,” Will murmured honestly. 

Pazzi inhaled. “You and I carry the dead with us,  _ Signor _ Graham. We both need to unburden.”

“Why don’t you carry your dead back to the Chapel before you count yourself among them?”

Pazzi studied him and his half-smile. “You are already dead,” he accused. “Aren’t you?”

Will almost laughed. Oh, how right he was. Will was dead, and on his way to find the Devil. 

“ _ Buonanotte, commendatore. _ ” Will backed away into the darkness, leaving Pazzi to whatever fate befell him. 

He continued to search for Hannibal, moving deeper into the catacombs. The light footsteps had faded, but Will did not lose hope. He walked faster, more desperate to find his monster. He did not think Hannibal had remained in the Norman Chapel for this long only to ignore Will when he came looking. Hannibal felt just as drawn to Will as Will did to him. Their strong, tangled connection went both ways. 

For better or for worse. 

Finally, Will went deep enough into the maze that the light of the candles started to fade. He did not have a flashlight to continue on, but he knew Hannibal was likely in that darkness. Hannibal was close. 

Will could feel him, as close as he was. He almost imagined he could hear Hannibal’s breathing, in rhythm with his own. Will tilted his head back to listen again, but instead words bubbled out of him. 

“Hannibal,” he called. 

All the things he felt when speaking to Abigail earlier, all the emotions swirling inside of him since waking up in the hospital, alone and gutted — it all culminated inside him in that moment, until Will could no longer hold back the words screaming from his heart. 

“I forgive you.” 

Will stood in that near darkness for several minutes, forlornly awaiting a response that would never come. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading :) The next chapter might take longer because I'm busy with school right now, but I'm hoping no more than two weeks!!


	4. Secondo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will looked back at her over his shoulder. “How ever did you find yourself in this situation?” 
> 
> She walked down a few more steps to be even with him, so they were now having a face-to-face conversation. “That question applies to both of us.”
> 
> Will laughed quietly. “And the answer’s probably the same. What’s your name?”
> 
> The woman studied him over the barrel of her rifle. “Chiyoh. How do you know Hannibal?”
> 
> “One could argue, intimately,” Will replied with absolutely no hesitation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are like 1.5 original, "missing" scenes in this chapter, which combined with everything else that happens in this episode makes this chapter almost 8k! Next chapter will probably be shorter haha, but enjoy this one :)

Hannibal reclined in his velvet armchair in front of the fireplace, staring at an old stain on the wall. He was thinking about Will, more now than he had consciously allowed himself to do for months. 

He had left Antony’s body in the shape of a heart in the Chapel in Palermo for Will, and after seeing him and hearing him Hannibal knew Will understood what he was saying. Will had always understood Hannibal’s feelings through his tableaus. 

_ I gave you a rare gift. But you didn’t want it.  _

He simply left Will the gift he had given him all those months ago, the gift Will had broken. His heart. 

Hannibal had lived eight months without stepping foot in the Norman Chapel. Not because he didn’t want to go, because he _ did. _ He knew Will would be there sometime, searching for him. Hannibal ached to go to him, but he buried that ache deep inside and focused on the pain Will had brought him instead. 

Hannibal was too proud to give in that easily. He would not simply run straight to Will, not after he had betrayed him so utterly. No matter what his broken heart wanted. 

He spent eight months suppressing his urges, ignoring the pull to Palermo, but then an opportunity presented itself with Antony that Hannibal could not resist. 

Now, sitting in his apartment in Florence, he allowed himself to think about Will. He looked healthy, and Hannibal was glad to see him have no difficulty walking, sitting, or standing. It seemed as if the doctors in charge of repairing the damage Hannibal had inflicted had done a good job. 

He wondered what Will’s scar looked like. How big it was, how jagged. What color it was, how it would feel under Hannibal’s hands. Under his tongue. 

‘Was it nice to see him?” Bedelia’s soft voice cut through his melancholy musings. 

Hannibal did not look at her but instead continued staring at the stain.

“It was nice,” he reflected quietly. “Among other things. He knew where to look for me.”

Just like Hannibal hoped he would. He hoped Will would remember what he said to him, all those months ago in front of the fireplace in his office. It was nice to know that Will listened to him, saw him, and predicted him better than anyone else. That ordeal of being known, however, came with a certain amount of longing — and a certain amount of pain. 

“You knew where he would look for you,” Bedelia said, pulling Hannibal’s thoughts straight out of his head. She always was a good psychiatrist. 

Hannibal supposed this was therapy, once again. Their sessions always included talking about Will, after all. 

“He said he forgave me.” Hannibal’s voice shook at the memory. What emotion caused it to shake, however, was lost in the storm of feelings he was currently experiencing. Pain, sadness, yearning, relief, and grief. It was all there, more emotion than he had felt in years. Hannibal had long since credited Will for making him feel alive, and he was proving it once again. 

“Forgiveness is too great and difficult for one person. It requires two: the betrayer, and the betrayed.” Bedelia placed herself within Hannibal’s field of vision, but he continued to avoid her gaze. “Which one are you?”

Hannibal thought about all the things he had put Will through, and all the things Will had put him through. “I’m vague on those details.”

Bedelia paused. “Betrayal and forgiveness are… best seen as something akin to falling in love.”

Hannibal considered her words as another shard of his heart broke off to stab what was left. “You cannot control with respect to whom you fall in love.”

He had never quite denied what was strongly brewing inside, but now Hannibal would admit it freely. To himself, and to others. He had fallen in love with Will Graham, beyond all control. 

Hannibal usually hated not being in control. It wasn’t something he experienced often. He was used to keeping perfect control over his life, his actions, and his emotions. It was how he remained undiscovered for so long. 

Then Will had come along and shattered Hannibal’s impeccable control. The love he felt for Will was cosmic, something wild and beyond all power or reason. 

Bedelia was silent for a moment, gracefully leaving Hannibal alone with his confession. He knew she was jealous of Will, and although that knowledge usually brought him amusement, he could not find it within himself to be amused right now. His endless yearning for Will was overpowering his usual and careful emotional regulation. Yet another example of how Will caused him to lose control. 

“You are going to be caught,” Bedelia warned. “It has already been set into motion.”

Hannibal blinked through his tears and focused enough on Bedelia to respond. Of course he was going to be caught,  _ Hannibal _ had already set it into motion. He wanted Will to find him. It was the one thing he was determined to control. 

He wasn’t sure if he would be able to control himself once Will caught him, however. 

“Is that concern for your patient or concern for yourself?”

“I’m not concerned about me,” Bedelia responded, looking slightly afraid that Hannibal was inquiring as to her motivations. It was almost laughable, that she thought Hannibal was unaware of her reasons for staying with him. Almost. 

Bedelia was afraid of him, but she was more curious about him. Hannibal had long since decided that her curiosity was going to get her killed. He was not a man that let people get close to him and escape unscathed. What he did to Will should have warned her of that fact. 

Except with Will, Hannibal did not want him to escape. He wanted Will to return to him. It was a silly desire, one that Hannibal could not allow to overpower his self-preservation. However, that internal fight was getting harder to win each passing day.

“I know exactly how I will navigate my way out of whatever it is I’ve gotten myself into,” Bedelia was saying as Hannibal settled his thoughts. “Do you?”

Hannibal glanced at her. “I did.” 

Bedelia waited for him to say more, but when the silence stretched on and it became clear that he would not elaborate, she sighed. 

“Where will Will Graham be looking for you next?” she asked, taking a large sip of wine. 

Hannibal stared into the fire. “Someplace I can never go. Home.”

* * *

Will left his boat docked in Palermo and took the first flight out of the city’s small airport to Vilnius, Lithuania.

He only packed as much as he needed for a few days, but made sure to pack his best clothes. He was going to Hannibal’s home, trying to understand Hannibal better, and it wouldn’t do to be underdressed for such an occasion. 

Hannibal would find it rude. 

Will spent the entire flight to Hannibal’s homeland thinking about what he might find when he arrived. It was a nice change, thinking about the future instead of ruminating on the past. Will liked it, even through his fear. 

He wasn’t afraid of the future because it was uncertain, like most people were. Constantly imagining what-if scenarios was something Will was accustomed to, but it didn’t bring him any anxiety. Many of those future paths were things outside of his control, and as such he didn’t let those possibilities bother him. It wouldn’t do any good. 

Instead, Will was scared of the future that was in his control. He was afraid of his future actions, of what he might do after diving so deep into Hannibal that he couldn’t get out. He was afraid that he would give in to that dark pleasure that rippled under his skin every time he considered what Hannibal stood for, and what he offered. 

For the very same reason Will was afraid, he was also excited. 

It felt like he was split down the middle, but both parts of himself were just that — himself. He couldn’t blame Hannibal for his dark side, but he could blame him for his influence in cultivating it. 

But, Will was starting to become less bothered by his moral duality. Nobody was all good or all bad, or even neatly split down the middle, and neither was he. He existed in thousands of shades of gray, and it was his free will to decide which shade he was going to act on in any given situation. 

What he was really afraid of was acting on a shade that he knew he shouldn’t. Morality was fussy that way, but Will clung to it like a lifeline. 

When his plane landed in Vilnius, he beelined straight for the car rental counter and managed to get a Jeep. The four-wheel drive would be useful, since he didn’t know what awaited him in  Aukštaitija. The path to Hannibal’s childhood home could be completely overgrown, which Will thought was a real possibility given what he knew about Hannibal’s early experiences there. 

The Soviet occupation, the loss of his parents. The loss of his sister — Mischa. 

The memory of Hannibal speaking her name, opening up about her loss in a rare moment of vulnerability, was seared into Will’s mind. 

He drove north from Vilnius to the Aukštaitija region. He didn’t know exactly where Hannibal’s estate was located, but he figured some locals would know. He tried to research the exact location before his flight, but didn’t find any conclusive answers. He just knew it was somewhere in the countryside, near the mountains. 

Will headed to  Kaltanėnai,  a small village on the edge of the forest with a population of about 200 people. The town’s tavern was a musty little thing squished on the main street, but it was the most lively establishment when Will arrived in the early afternoon, folk music spilling out onto the old cobblestones. 

Will sat at the bar, ordered a beer on tap, and got to work. 

The people inside the tavern were about what Will expected from an Eastern-European small village. They were hardened, as evidenced by the firm set of their eyes and the calluses on their hands. But they were also joyful, laughter coming easily and music being danced to in the corner of the room. Will got a feeling of determined enjoyment after a hard day’s work from them, and his heart grew with pride. 

There was one older woman sitting at the bar, a few stools down from Will. She had more wrinkles and lines in her face than anyone else in the tavern, and she was working through glasses of Rye like it was soda. Will liked her. 

She also would be the best chance he had at getting information about Lecter Castle. This woman seemed old enough to remember the time before the Soviet occupation, and if she had lived here her whole life, as Will thought was likely, then she would know about the Lecter family. Even if the castle ended up being far away from this little town, the older generation probably remembered the names of their past nobility. 

Will got up from his stool near the door and made his way to the free one right next to her. 

“English?” he asked while taking a sip from his glass. 

She side-eyed him, predictably suspicious of a foreigner talking to her. She nodded but didn’t say anything else. 

“I’m here on a very important trip researching the history of the old Lithuanian nobility,” Will started. “Do you remember the Lecters?”

That got her attention, and her old eyes locked onto his as she turned to face him. 

“What do you want to know about them?” she said in heavily accented English. 

Will felt a surge of excitement go through him but forced his body to stay calm and casual. “I found records that they had a castle around here, but I’m not sure of the exact location. Do you know where it is?”

She tipped back the rest of her drink with gnarled fingers. “It’s a cursed place. You do not want to go there.”

Will shrugged. “I’d like to see the grounds, and discover the family crest. There aren’t any good depictions of it in the research I’ve combed through.” 

The woman snorted.  “ _ Bulšitas.” _

Will blinked. He didn’t know Lithuanian, but that word was universal. Bullshit. 

“You are no researcher,” the woman stated. “You are curious because of the  _ pabaisa. _ ”

“ _ Pabaisa _ ?” Will asked, eyes narrowed. 

“Monster. We may not be as modern as the rest of the world, young man, but we are not stupid. You are not the first person to come through town looking for the castle after the  _ pabaisa _ was discovered.”

Will exhaled. “You’re talking about Hannibal Lecter.”

She nodded, her headscarf brushing the soft fabric of her coat. “It was a surprise to some in town to find out the monster had its nest here, but I knew better. I remember before the war, when the Lecters would visit town for the winter festivals.”

Will leaned closer to her, putting his elbows on the old wooden bar. “What was he like?” 

The woman just stared at him with an unimpressed face, like  _ why should I tell you? Tourist.  _

“Please,” Will whispered, swallowing his pride. “I-I knew him. In America.” 

The old woman’s eyes widened and she studied him, looking for any sign that he was lying. When she found none, she sighed. 

“He was an odd little boy. Serious as a man, more serious than his Papa. I only saw him smile around his sister.”

Will inhaled. “Mischa.”

She nodded sadly. “A tragedy, what happened to that family. Perfect breeding grounds for the  _ pabaisa  _ to grow.”

Will imagined Hannibal as a young boy, walking through the narrow streets Will had just explored. It was a picture that made him ache to know more. 

“Where is the castle?” Will asked again, softer this time. 

The old woman sighed. “Take the main road out of town, north for 10 miles. There is an old road on the left side, almost hidden now. We do not go to that place anymore, and neither should you.”

“Thank you,” Will murmured. “For telling me where it is, and for telling me about him.”

She eyed him then grabbed his glass and drained the liquor in one go.

“You should let the  _ pabaisa _ go,” she warned. “Monsters do not love after they have lost.” 

* * *

Will found the castle later that evening, when the sun was just starting to descend behind the fog of the clouds. It was on a hill, surrounded by other hills thick with forest. He walked through the overgrowth to get a closer look, the branches seeming to lean towards Will in a threatening way, as if he was a knight fighting his way through to the dragon’s lair. 

The castle was crumbling, and after finding all the doors locked Will searched the cemetery. He found Mischa’s grave, and something unexpected. Fresh flowers. 

Will retreated back into the forest, deciding to watch the castle, it’s little hunting cottage, and the cemetery at a distance. If anyone was living there or visiting, Will only had to wait to see who it would be. He hoped it would be someone he could talk to about Hannibal, and this place. 

In the meantime, he made do with the Hannibal living in his mind palace. He looked just as Will remembered from those last days together before everything blew up, outfit comfortably in a fine suit. He looked so good, so familiar, it made Will’s heart hurt.

“It’s not healing to see your childhood home, but it helps you measure whether you are broken. How and why, assuming you want to know,” Hannibal spoke. 

Will imagined them sitting across from each other in the woods, seated in the chairs Hannibal had in his office, now resting on the dry leaves. 

“I want to know,” Will replied. He wanted to know everything about Hannibal, to understand him better than anyone else, better than even Will himself had up until now. He wanted to know Hannibal. 

“Is this where construction began?” Will wondered.

“On my memory palace?” Hannibal clarified. “Its door is at the center of my mind. And here you are, feeling for the latch.”

Will’s lips twitched on a smile. “The spaces in your mind devoted to your earliest years, are they different from the other rooms?”

He wouldn’t get any answers from this Hannibal, not real ones. But imagining what Hannibal might say was more comforting to Will than not thinking about him at all, and it seemed his subconscious agreed. 

“Are they different than this room?” Will said, now imagining them in Hannibal’s old office. 

The imagined Hannibal considered. “This room holds sound and motion, great snakes wrestling and heaving in the dark.”

Will wanted to smile again. They were the snakes, fighting in the dark of this room with their games for each other. He did think Hannibal would like reliving his memories here. 

Hannibal continued. “Other rooms are static scenes, fragmentary like painted shards of glass.”

Will thought about that. “Everything keyed to memories leading to other memories. Rooms you can’t bring yourself to go. Nothing escapes from them that causes you any comfort.”

“Screams fill some of those places,” Hannibal acknowledged. “But the corridors do not echo screaming, because I hear music.”

Will was brought out of his thoughts about Hannibal’s mind palace by two gunshots fired in the darkening evening light. He followed the sound, and came across a clearing. 

There was a woman pheasant hunting. She was young, and of Asian heritage. Will hid before she could see him, and followed her back to the hunting cottage. So she was the one staying here, and taking care of Mischa’s grave. 

But who was she? Some sort of caretaker?

Will wasn’t sure, but he was sure as hell going to find out. 

* * *

Hannibal chipped away at the block of ice on the table, finding himself in a much better mood tonight than in the past few days. Cooking always tended to improve his mood, and he was grateful to have something to distract himself from his constant thoughts of Will. 

He was determined to have a good time tonight, in spite of having Professor Sogliato as his guest. Or rather, he was determined to have a good time because of his presence. Hannibal was already happily considering the possible ways in which he would inevitably kill him. 

Bedelia seemed to know what he planned and tried to stay out of his way, graciously offering Professor Sogliato some meat before gliding around the table back to her seat. 

“The  _ Studiolo _ is a small, fierce group,” Hannibal mused as he chipped away at the ice block. “They have ruined a number of academic reputations.” 

“Appearing before them is a peril,” Sogliato said with thinly veiled mockery. 

Hannibal smiled. “You were very eager to see me discredited, Professor Sogliato.”

Sogliato made a sound of displeasure. “You sang for your supper before the dragons at the  _ Studiolo. _ ”

“And you sang very well,” Bedelia cut in graciously, obviously trying to diffuse some of the tension. 

Sogliato clapped mockingly. “First applause, and then by wet-eyed acclamation the memberships affirmed you as master of the _ Palazzo Capponi. _ ”

Hannibal glanced at him over his busy hands. He wasn’t sure if he’d ever met a man so incredibly rude to his dinner hosts before. Hannibal was quite excited to teach Professor Sogliato a lesson in manners. He smiled and finished up the shaved ice drinks. 

“Punch Romaine,” Hannibal announced, handing glasses to both Bedelia and Sogliato. “A cocktail created by Escoffier. Served to first-class guests on the  _ Titanic _ during their last dinner.”

He smiled widely, pleased at the irony of the drink. Bedelia looked displeased, knowing what Hannibal was up to, but he didn’t care about her reaction. Sogliato’s innocent enjoyment of the cocktail was enough to amuse Hannibal, distracting him from the fresh pain of seeing Will. 

“The committees have a new curator,” Sogliato toasted with his Punch Romaine. “They do not miss the old one.”

“If my victory pleased the  _ professore _ I could not tell,” Hannibal said lightly, making his way back to the head of the table where the ice block stood. 

“Then you weren’t paying attention,” Sogliato replied coolly. 

“I pay lots of attention. Though not in a wide-eyed, indiscriminate way,” Hannibal stated calmly as he swiftly took the ice pick and sank it into Professor Sogliato’s temple with ease. 

Sogliato’s eyes widened and he made a few choking sounds, still perfectly alive but completely paralyzed. Bedelia stared at him in horror, somehow not expecting the scene before her. 

Hannibal sat down in his seat, picked up a slice of meat, and sighed. 

“That may have been impulsive,” he allowed.

Bedelia recovered from her shock. “Been mulling that impulse ever since you decided to serve Punch Romaine.”

Hannibal glanced at her and chewed on his meat. He’d been mulling that impulse for a lot longer, ever since it was created from his desire to distract himself from Will’s predictable appearance and unpredictable forgiveness.

Sogliato started to giggle. “I-I can’t see.”

He muttered some indecipherable Italian through spouts of laughter. Hannibal was thoroughly enjoying the show but Bedelia looked cross. She picked up her napkin, walked around the table, and forcefully pulled the ice pick out of Sogliato’s temple. 

The Italian man’s head immediately thunked onto the table, blood pouring out of his wound and drowning his plate of olives. 

“Technically,” Hannibal leaned forward, still chewing his food, “You killed him.” 

Bedelia blinked, looking somewhat concerned about her increased level of participation. She inhaled shakily. “No longer interested in preserving the peace you found here?”

Hannibal regarded her. Her shock at his actions just cemented the fact that she really didn’t know him at all. 

“You cannot preserve entropy,” he explained loudly. “It gradually descends into disorder.”

Bedelia was not impressed. “Two men from the  _ Capponi _ are dead.”

“I can only claim one,” Hannibal reminded, amused. “Technically.”

She studied him. “You’re drawing them to you, aren’t you? All of them.” 

All of them, indeed. This wouldn’t just attract Will, this would attract actual law enforcement, and likely Jack Crawford. The resulting pandemonium would be just the trick to help Hannibal work through the pain he felt from seeing Will again. Hannibal smiled. 

He wanted them to come. He was curious what would happen. 

* * *

Will camped out in the forest, not wanting to leave the vicinity of Lecter Castle. He stared into the small fire he created, thinking about what Hannibal was doing at that moment. Was he still in Palermo, or did he return to Florence? Will sighed. He wasn’t supposed to be thinking about Hannibal as he was right now, he was supposed to focus on understanding how he became what he did. 

Will’s thoughts were interrupted by the snap of a twig, a loud crack in the silence of the forest. He quickly stamped the fire out and turned his flashlight on instead, on high alert for whatever was in the forest with him. Could it be the woman?

Will stalked through the underbrush and the trees before he felt the hair stand up on the back of his neck. Something was watching him. 

He turned around and could vaguely make out the distinctive shape of antlers through the mess of tree branches. It seemed the Wendigo was a fitting choice for Will’s conflicted subconscious tonight. He couldn’t deny the yearning he felt as he gazed upon it, although whether he was yearning for violence or for companionship, Will couldn’t say. Those two desires were often too intertwined for him when it came to Hannibal. 

Will was suddenly distracted from the eerie Wendigo by the presence of fireflies all around him. The lightning bugs were brighter than those Will remembered from his youth in the South, but they were just as friendly. 

There were dozens of them, and as Will watched them he realized that they were all coming from the same direction. 

He followed them out of the dark forest and into a courtyard with a fountain covered in ivy. Will hadn’t come across this place from his exploration of the grounds earlier, and he was thankful that the fireflies led him to this undiscovered part of Hannibal’s childhood home. 

He touched his gloved hand to the lichen-covered stone of the old fountain, and traced the outline of a child’s hand in old, flaking red paint. Will wondered if it was Hannibal’s hand, or Mischa’s. His fingers curled on top of the old stone as he thought about the boy Hannibal once was, the monster that had yet to reach full maturity. 

With a pang of something in his chest, Will realized that’s exactly how Hannibal saw him — a fledgling killer, one made of the same essence as Hannibal, yet entirely unique, with gallons of untapped potential. Except, not quite untapped anymore. 

Will rose from the fountain and quietly made his way back to the hunting cabin where he saw the woman. He wasn’t getting any sleep tonight, so he may as well do something productive. 

He blended into the woods around him and watched her through the window as she prepared one of the pheasants she caught earlier for dinner. However, to Will’s surprise, she did not settle down and eat it. Instead, she packed the meat in a bag, grabbed her rifle and a lantern, and headed outside into the night. 

Curiosity now piqued, Will wasted no time following her from the shadows towards the castle. She opened a grate around the backside of the towering building, and Will followed silently down some stairs into what seemed to be the castle basement. 

He came upon a corridor lit with candles, and found old racks of bottled wine along the sides of the walls. There were live snails on the walls, leaving incandescent slime trails everywhere they went. He stepped forward to get a closer look at his surroundings, and his feet crunched something on the ground. Will bent down to see little bones and empty snail shells scattered everywhere, picking up the one he stepped on. It was brittle, white, and had clearly been down here for a while. 

Will was a little confused. Why would there be random snail shells and chicken bones everywhere? If this woman was supposed to be taking care of Hannibal’s home, she was doing a very poor job of it. He would not be pleased at this mess. 

Suddenly, a deep voice rasped through the silence. Will snapped his flashlight into the direction of the voice, and illuminated a patchwork barrier blocking off the rest of the wine corridor. Will narrowed his eyes and made out iron bars. It looked like a cell.

Will stepped closer and looked through the bars to see a haggard, skinny man reaching out for him and speaking foreign words. He was dirty, unshaven, and barely clothed. He reeked of excrement and filth. In his hands was the cooked pheasant that Will had seen the woman prepare earlier. 

Before Will could make sense of what he was seeing, he heard the sound of a gun cocking behind him. 

He turned around slowly, with his hands raised, to see the woman from before standing in front of him, pointing her rifle directly at him. 

“You’re upsetting him,” she stated firmly. “You’re trespassing.”

Will did not answer right away. “I’m a friend of Hannibal’s.” 

She raised her head slightly. “He sent you?”

“My name is Will Graham,” he said, ignoring her question. “I’m unarmed. Uh, may I lower my arms?”

“This trigger has a three-pound pull. I’m holding two of it.”

The man in the cage behind Will’s back started speaking again, drawing Will’s attention back to the more unexpected presence in the small corridor. “What’s he saying?”

The woman did not lower her gun. “He wants you to look at him, speak to him. But you’re not going to.”

Will studied her. “You’ve cast aside the social graces normally afforded to human beings.”

“He’s cast them aside,” she said with loathing. “All he’s allowed is the sound of water. It’s what the unborn hear. It’s their last memory of peace.”

Will pushed harder. “You’re keeping him like an animal.”

She smiled. “I wouldn’t do this to an animal.”

She gestured with her gun, and Will walked out of the basement and back into the cool night air with his hands up and a gun trained on his back.

“What did he do?” Will asked once they were halfway down the steps that led back to the hunting cabin. 

“He ate her,” she replied. 

Will stopped walking. “Mischa?”

If that was true, it meant that the man had been a captive for a long time. Will still didn’t know the details, but he knew that Hannibal had lost Mischa when he was still a child himself. If that man back there  _ ate _ her, then… 

“How long has he been your prisoner?” Will inquired. 

“We have been each other’s prisoner for a very long time,” the woman confirmed. 

Will looked back at her over his shoulder. “How ever did you find yourself in this situation?” 

She walked down a few more steps to be even with him, so they were now having a face-to-face conversation. “That question applies to both of us.”

Will laughed quietly. “And the answer’s probably the same. What’s your name?”

The woman studied him over the barrel of her rifle. “Chiyoh. How do you know Hannibal?”

“One could argue, intimately,” Will replied with absolutely no hesitation. 

“ _ Nakama _ ?” she asked. “It’s a Japanese word for very close friends.”

Will held back another laugh. “Friends” didn’t seem like an appropriate label. Even “close friends” didn’t quite cover the intimate connection Hannibal and he shared, but Will didn’t know another word to describe it. 

“Yes, we were  _ nakama _ ,” he nodded. “Last time I saw him, he, uh…”

Will lowered one of his raised hands to lift his shirt just high enough to show Chiyoh his scar. “He left me with a smile.”

Chiyoh took in the sight of his healed abdominal scar and slowly lowered her gun. 

“All sorrows can be borne if you put them in a story.” She stepped closer. “Tell me a story.” 

Will nodded, and together the two of them marched back to the hunting cabin. Chiyoh opened the door for him, and Will entered a large living room, more lavish than any hunting cabin he’d ever seen, and decorated in the Japanese style. She gestured to a nearby low-table and Will sat, waiting until Chiyoh returned with tea to break the silence between them. 

“We construct fairy tales, and we accept them,” Will began. “Our minds concoct all sorts of fantasies when we don’t want to believe something.”

She considered his words. “I accept what Hannibal has done. I understand why he has done it.”

Will smiled slightly. It appeared as if Chiyoh was well aware of who Hannibal is, and what he has done. He wondered how exactly she knew Hannibal, if she was the caretaker for his estate and even knew about Mischa. 

“Mischa doesn’t explain Hannibal,” Will disagreed. “She doesn’t quantify what he does.”

Hannibal was not someone to be broken down into simple childhood trauma, no matter how horrific that trauma may be. He was something altogether different, something  _ other. _ Something like Will. 

“He does what was done to her,” Chiyoh pointed out.

Will did not break eye contact with her. “How do you know it was your prisoner who killed Mischa?”

Chiyoh looked down briefly. “Hannibal told me so.”

She glanced back up and met his eyes. “Hannibal took someone from you. Are you here to take someone from him?”

Will was silent for a moment, and poured them both more tea before answering. “If I were like Hannibal, I would’ve killed you already. Cooked you, ate you, and fed what was left of you to him. That’s what he would do.”

Chiyoh did not appear frightened by his statement. If anything, she looked amused. “You’ve given that some thought.”

Will didn’t dignify that with an answer. Of course he’d given that some thought. All his thoughts now revolved around Hannibal. No matter what he tried, he couldn’t get the man out of his head. After everything that’s happened, Will wasn’t sure he wanted Hannibal out of his head. Not yet. 

“Do you know where he is?” Will asked, changing the subject. 

“Why are you looking for him, after he left you.” Chiyoh’s eyes flicked down to Will’s stomach. “With a smile.” 

Will’s hand unconsciously went to press against his scar through his shirt and he thought about the answer, more than he’d allowed himself to think about it before. He knew he wanted to find Hannibal, but the reason behind that…

“I’ve never known myself as well as I know myself when I’m with him,” Will whispered. 

Chiyoh looked away.

“You won’t find Hannibal here,” she finally replied. “There are places on these grounds he cannot safely go. Bad memories.” 

Will knew that. It’s why he came here in the first place, to break through the barriers in Hannibal’s mind, to truly see all of him. Will wanted to know him completely, just as Hannibal knew him. 

“What do these grounds hold for you?” Will wondered. 

“Hannibal wanted to kill that man for what he did to Mischa. I wouldn’t let him take his life, so Hannibal left his life with me.”

Will wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. “He was curious if you would kill. I imagine he still is.”

It was a sentiment Will was familiar with.  _ Intimately. _

* * *

Hannibal knelt behind the copper tub, carefully massaging shampoo into his companion’s wet hair. Dinner with one of his coworkers at the  _ Palazzo _ and his wife had gone spectacularly well. Hannibal was in good spirits after watching them unknowingly feed on the remnants of Sogliato. 

“What were you like as a young man?” Bedelia inquired softly. 

Hannibal did not take offense to this question. His past was hanging over both of them as of late, ever since he confided in her that Will had returned to his childhood home. He found himself reflecting on that time in his life more than he had in years, and could tell that Bedelia was incredibly curious about it. 

“I was rooting for Mephistopheles and contemptuous of Faust,” Hannibal replied with a small smile. 

Bedelia digested that before speaking again. “Would you like to talk about your first spring lamb?”

Hannibal kept lathering her hair, hands moving in slow, circular motions. “Would you?”

Bedelia chose to ignore his warning. “Why can’t you go home, Hannibal? What happened to you there?”

Images threatened to break through the thickest iron doors of Hannibal’s mind palace, but he kept them back. 

“Nothing happened to me,” he said, simply but firmly. “ _ I _ happened.”

There was silence for a moment, only the soft sound of soap suds moving against each other. Then, Bedelia spoke for the final time. 

“How did your sister taste?” she whispered. 

Hannibal’s hands stilled and his sharp eyes flicked to Bedelia’s face, but she was already sinking into the tub, water obscuring her features until the whole of her disappeared under the surface. 

Hannibal straightened up, dried his hands off, and walked into the large bedroom that was once meant to be his and Will’s. 

* * *

After his conversation with Chiyoh, Will declined her offer for a warm bed and ventured back into the woods outside. He had always been more comfortable with nature than with people, and besides. He had a design to test. 

Will wasn’t entirely sure what he wanted to accomplish as he took the prisoner out of his cage and freed him in the woods behind the castle. Part of him was fine if the man decided to run away, but a larger part of him, the part well-educated on the psychology of captives, knew that such an outcome would be incredibly unlikely. This same part of Will was the part that was blurring with Hannibal. 

The part that was curious what would happen.

As Will waited in the dark outside the entrance to the castle basement, he knew he couldn’t blame his actions on Hannibal, no matter how blurred the two of them were. As Bedelia once said, what Hannibal does is not coercion. It is persuasion.

The Hannibal created by Will’s subconscious materialized then, clad in a crisp suit he often wore to their therapy sessions. Will leaned back against a tree, and resigned himself rather enthusiastically to a discussion with this version of Hannibal. 

“Are we blurring together, Will?” he wondered. ”Or is it that you are cultivating your instincts, the dark ones that are summoned by my own darkness that still resides in this place?”

His words remind Will of something Hannibal said to him once, when the veil between them had first been thinned. 

_ If you followed the urges you kept down for so long, cultivated them as the inspirations they are, then you would become someone other than yourself. _

“I feel closer to you here,” Will said quietly. “I haven’t quite decided yet if I like that or not.”

“You haven’t decided a lot of things,” Hannibal observes. “But is that what you really came here for?”

Will’s gaze is drawn off Hannibal towards the light of the hunting cabin door opening and closing. He watched as Chiyoh headed down to the basement, completely ignorant of what she was about to find. 

“No,” Will replied. “It’s not.”

_ I came here for you, _ he thought as he watched Chiyoh descend the steps into the dark. 

He didn’t follow, content to let things play out naturally. He didn’t manipulate a lot, just enough to increase his chances for the targeted result. He knew it was something Hannibal would do, and he felt a bit of resentment about it, but more than anything he felt good. He felt closer to Hannibal with his actions, which brought him pleasure, but on top of that he felt  _ good _ . A quiet thrum of power, punctuated by Chiyoh’s scream of horror. 

Will left Hannibal in the woods of his childhood home, and entered the basement to find Chiyoh huddled in the corner. The skeletal body of her prisoner was on the ground in front of her, blood leaking out from a fresh wound on his neck. He was obviously dead. 

“You did this,” Chiyoh accused softly, staring at the man’s body. “You set him free.”

“It was you I wanted to set free,” Will said, walking towards her. 

Chiyoh blinked. “You said Hannibal was curious if I would kill.” She turned her head to look Will in the eyes. “You were curious too.”

“I didn’t want this,” he denied half-heartedly. 

“Yes you did,” Chiyoh scoffed. “You were doing what he does. He’d be proud of you. His  _ nakama _ ,” she finished mockingly.

Will felt warmth swell in his chest at her words. Hannibal’s pride, much like the rest of him, was an addiction. 

“Did you know?” Will asked, turning the focus back on her. “At some level… you knew.”

He studied her, stiff with shock at what she’s done and anger at Will for orchestrating it. He took one of the dusty bottles of wine from the racks, pulled the cork out with his knife, and offered it to her.

“He created a story out of events that only he experienced,” Will said. It was so obvious that Hannibal had lied to her, curious what Chiyoh would do, that Will wondered how she did not see it. Denial was a powerful drug, but Will preferred to think that he was the only one who knew Hannibal so well as to see the true meaning behind all his actions. He felt weirdly possessive over the privilege his empathy bestowed upon him — the privilege to see Hannibal.

_ I let you know me. See me.  _

Will took a deep breath and repeated her words from earlier. “All sorrows can be borne if you put them in a story.”

Chiyoh took a sip of the wine. “For Mischa,” she whispered with tears on her face. 

She glanced at the body of her prisoner one last time before standing up and taking hold of her rifle. She passed Will on her way out of the basement, pausing for a moment before heading up the steps. 

“‘I’ll help you find him.”

Will frowned, once again curious. “Why would you help me?”

Chiyoh fixed him with an unimpressed stare. “I have no reason to stay here. Not anymore. You saw to that.”

She departed, and Will was left alone with the body of a man Hannibal left years ago for Chiyoh to kill. The longer he stared at it, the more vividly a picture formed in his mind.

Will’s eyes found the old, green bottles of wine and he thought of the fireflies outside. They were beautiful, and he wanted to transform this unworthy man into something beautiful. It was something Hannibal would do, but more importantly it was something Will  _ wanted _ to do. 

He thought about how he honored Randall Tier by displaying him as the creature he was, and thought he would do something similar to this man. If Hannibal’s design was to humiliate his victims by elevating them to a level of beauty they were not deserving of, Will’s design was to honor his victims by transforming them into their true selves.

He started by smashing all the bottles of wine he could find and assembling them into large, glittering wings. The sight of them made him breathless, and he finally turned to the body. 

He took his time, uncaring that Chiyoh was waiting for him. She needed time to process what just happened, and Will needed time to build his monument. 

There was enough rope lying around in the basement for Will to fully wrap the prisoner’s body like a mummy. He attached the wings to the back and tied a thick rope around the entire thing, intending to hoist it up high into the open air where the basement stairs first meet the candle-lit corridor leading to the cell. Before he could do so, however, he paused. 

Something was missing.

Will looked around and his eyes caught on the glistening slime trail of the snails. As he glanced around, he discovered that in fact the place was crawling with them. He thought about Hannibal’s appetite and smiled. The snails would make the perfect final addition to his design. 

Will spent a fair amount of time collecting snails and placing them onto the wrapped body, but it didn’t feel like a chore. On the contrary, Will felt like he was doing something divine. He was using Hannibal’s materials to make his own unique tableau, in the place Hannibal first became.

When he was finally satisfied, he pulled on the rope with effort and lifted his firefly into the air. The dozens of live snails decorating the body were content to devour their perch, their movements adding life to Will’s display of death. Will grunted with effort as he made the glass wings spread out behind the body, glittering in the candlelight. 

He tied the rope to an iron sconce and stepped forward to take in the full picture of his creation.

He intended it to be a firefly, but the longer Will gazed at it the more he saw the image of a moth, emerging from its chrysalis as something different than what it was before. 

_ I can feed the caterpillar and I can whisper through the chrysalis, but what hatches follows its own nature and is beyond me. _

Will thought it was fitting, making a monument to Hannibal reflecting both his childhood in this place and Will’s becoming. As he transformed the prisoner, Hannibal had transformed him. With this tableau, Will was telling Hannibal he understood. He understood, and he no longer differentiated what parts of himself were Hannibal and what parts of himself were him. There was still much to work through, but Will accepted Hannibal. Perhaps more important, he was beginning to accept himself. 

“Your designs are always beautiful to behold, Will,” Hannibal’s voice echoed softly behind him. 

“You probably won’t ever see this,” Will whispered. 

“If I did,” Hannibal assured him, “I would be so proud of you.”

Will turned to meet his gaze and smiled faintly. Without saying anything more, Will walked out of the bowels of Lecter Ca stle to meet Chiyoh outside. He did not have to chase after Hannibal’s ghost any longer, now that he was ready to find the real thing.

* * *

“What your sister made you feel,” Bedelia started, standing with her arms crossed. “Was beyond your conscious ability to control or predict.”

“Or negotiate,” Hannibal added lightly. He was seated at the grand piano in their apartment, which served to create beautiful music. In spite of this, Hannibal could not help but miss his harpsichord. It would have made this impromptu therapy session much more bearable.

“I would suggest,” Bedelia continued, “what Will Graham makes you feel is not dissimilar. A force of mind and circumstance.”

Hannibal’s hands flew lightly over the keys, playing one of the many melodies he had memorized. Bedelia was quite right, as she often was nowadays when it came to his emotions.

“Love,” Hannibal supplied. He thought of his feelings for past Mischa and his current feelings for Will, and smiled. “He pays you a visit or he doesn’t.”

“Same with forgiveness,” Bedelia replied seriously, not matching his smile. “And I would argue, the same with betrayal.”

Hannibal’s eyes stayed focused on his playing but he inclined his head to indicate his agreement. “The god Betrayal. Who presupposes the god Forgiveness.”

The two concepts were gods, at least to Hannibal and Will. They were uncontrollable and unpredictable, much like Will and Hannibal’s betrayal and forgiveness for each other. 

“We can all betray,” Bedelia said softly. “Sometimes we have no other choice.”

Hannibal raised his eyes to burn into Bedelia’s. “Mischa didn’t betray me. She influenced me to betray myself, but I forgave her that influence.” Much like Will Graham, indeed. 

Bedelia was silent for a moment. 

“If past behavior is an indicator of future behavior,” she said slowly, “there is only one way you will forgive Will Graham.”

Hannibal thought back to his sister. She was a carefree, happy child, so full of joy that Hannibal could not control the love that blossomed within him as a result. Will was different from Mischa in many ways, but the love he inspired within Hannibal was the same. 

Bedelia was referring to consumption, but the two cases weren’t quite the same. Hannibal did not kill Mischa before he ate her, but he would kill Will if he decided to do what Bedelia was suggesting. He did not know if he was quite ready to take that step, or even if he could.

However, from the way things were going now Hannibal had to admit that Bedelia had a point. He had never been able to entirely predict Will, and he was worried that Will would choose to kill him after he learned of Hannibal’s childhood in Lithuania rather than join him. If that was the case, Hannibal did not see any other choice than the one Bedelia was suggesting. He did not want to live without Will, and this might be the only way to have him and forgive him in the same bite.

Hannibal finished the piano piece with a flourish and looked up, decided. 

“I have to eat him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Your comments always bring a smile to my face :)


	5. Contorno

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will washed his wounds with antiseptic, grimacing, and carefully dabbed antibiotic cream on them afterwards. He ignored the rest of the first-aid kit, though. He wasn’t about to put bandaids on his entire face, and it was probably better to let the wounds breathe, anyway. He wondered if Hannibal would have cleaned him up differently, if his practiced doctor’s hands would be purely clinical as they patched up his injuries or if they would touch with reverence.
> 
> Will remembered how Hannibal touched him after Randall Tier, how he bandaged Will’s hands with care. Will had never been touched so gently before, like he was worthy of being cherished.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a fun chapter to do, since Hannibal and Will both get injured hahahaha
> 
> Lots of the usual introspection and missing scenes, hope you enjoy! :)

The next day, Chiyoh and Will boarded a train in Vilnius headed towards Italy. Will bought the tickets to Florence, and Chiyoh stood beside him at the ticket line, silent. She said she would help Will find Hannibal, but truthfully Will did not need much help, only confirmation. Her silence was confirmation enough. 

They settled in one of the many cabins in the train that were outfitted for overnight, long-distance travel. A small room, with bunk beds and a table and chairs connected to the wall. Will had never been on a train before, let alone an old-fashioned, European one. It was the easiest way to travel, but Will was not taking stock of this new experience as much as he was imagining how his reunion with Hannibal would go. 

Chiyoh probably sensed that his thoughts were preoccupied with the future, and broke the tranquility between them with tales of the past. 

“On still evenings,” she reminisced, “when the air was damp after a rain, we played a game.”

Will stared out the window at the countryside passing by, and Chiyoh continued. “Hannibal would burn all kinds of barks and incense for me to identify by scent alone.”

Will could imagine it. Hannibal had an exceptional nose, one that had sniffed out both his aftershave and his encephalitis. He was tempted to ask Chiyoh who won the game, but he already knew the answer. 

“He was charming,” she mused, “The way a cub is charming. A small cub that grows up to be one of the big cats.”

Will thought back to the old woman in the village in  Aukštaitija, who compared Hannibal to a small monster who grew into its full potential. Comparing Hannibal to a cat was not much different, and in many ways accounted for his traits that could not be defined by the monster. Cunning, selfish, and finicky. 

“One you can’t play with later,” Will murmured. The more he thought about it, the more ironic it was. He had always been more of a dog person. 

Chiyoh met his gaze and seemed to want to say something, but sighed and leaned back into her seat.

“The day I met Hannibal,” she said, choosing another memory, “he was an orphan. I was meant to meet him with his sister, but he was alone.”

Will frowned, imagining a young boy on the cusp of his teenage years, wracked with grief and trauma. He wondered how long Hannibal had been alone, after losing Mischa. If there was anyone else who he felt such emotion for, anyone who would have eased his burden, or if Hannibal had to cope on his own, drawing from the monster’s strength. Will was afraid to know the answer. 

“How did you meet him?” he asked instead. He was dying to know how Chiyoh and Hannibal were connected, if only to satisfy his own jealousy. Will was jealous that Chiyoh knew things about Hannibal that he didn’t. 

“I was his aunt’s attendant. My parents sent me to learn from Lady Murasaki when I was just a girl,” Chiyoh answered softly.

That was new information. Will hadn’t heard of any family Hannibal had other than his sister, and perhaps that was because he hadn’t bonded with any of them except Mischa. It was apparent, however, that after his immediate family died, Hannibal had gone to live with his aunt and uncle, which afforded him a sort-of cousin, Chiyoh. 

Will understood now. Chiyoh was family, and family protects family. Will tried not to think of his own family, with Abigail, that he and Hannibal had destroyed together.

“I learned from Hannibal, too,” Chiyoh reflected. 

Will nodded. He had, as well. “He comes in the guise of a mentor, but it’s distress that excites him.”

Chiyoh glared. “I’m not in distress.”

“Not anymore,” Will said lightly. His mind wandered to the firefly tableau that he left behind in Hannibal’s childhood home. “You had a strict rule about taking life, and you broke it.” 

He studied her, and thought back to when Hannibal had first pushed him to take a life. It had been Randall Tier’s, and Will had not regretted it. “Is it on your mind? Do you see yourself killing him over and over?”

He asked because he was curious what the answer would be, if it would be the same as his own. 

“No. I see you.”

Will smiled. 

“How do you know Hannibal’s in Florence?” Chiyoh asked, changing the subject.

Will took a postcard out of his pocket and placed it on the table between them. “Botticelli.”

The postcard was of the  _ Primavera _ , the painting which Pazzi told him Hannibal had first recreated as  _ il Mostro _ . He bought the postcard in the Palermo airport right before getting on the plane for Lithuania. He couldn’t resist carrying around a physical reminder of where Hannibal was, and Will found himself spending most of his free time up until then gazing at the painting, trying to look at it through Hannibal’s eyes. 

It was truly beautiful, and just the type of art Hannibal wouldn’t be able to resist revisiting. 

Chiyoh regarded the postcard with minimal interest. “I’ve never been to Italy. I never expected to.”

Will said nothing. He never expected his life to turn out the way it had, either. He thought back to himself as a young man, 22 years old and fresh out of the NOPD training academy. That version of himself never would have expected to visit Europe, or even to visit Baltimore. He thought he was going to be a NOLA cop his entire life, maybe get lucky and settle down with someone who understood him, but his life had taken many twists and turns. 

Hannibal was the one who truly understood Will, and had provided him with many opportunities he never thought he would have.

He was pulled out of his thoughts by Chiyoh speaking again. “Birds eat thousands of snails every day. Some of those snails survive digestion and emerge to find they’ve traveled the world.”

Will hated to be compared to a snail, but couldn’t deny that Chiyoh was right. He had survived what Hannibal put him through, and found himself a different person in a different place.

“In the belly of the beast,” Will agreed.

* * *

Hannibal strolled through the Boboli Gardens in the late afternoon sun, pleased that he finished his work at the  _ Palazzo _ in time to visit the gardens while the sun still hung above the horizon. He had refrained from visiting his favorite places in Florence because they reminded him that Will was not here for Hannibal to show them to him, but he broke his self-imposed rule today.

He wanted to visit the gardens, alone, because he needed to think about Will.

Will was in Lithuania right now, but he would return to Hannibal soon. Hannibal’s skin crawled imagining Will in that dreaded place, but he understood why Will wanted to visit. He understood Will better than anyone.

Hannibal did not want to focus on what Will was discovering at his home and instead focused on what might happen when he returned.  _ When _ , not if, because Hannibal knew that Will would come back to him.

He hoped that Will would always come back to him.

When he did come back, this time, Hannibal needed to be ready. There were so many possibilities that Hannibal could predict occurring, but there were also possibilities that he had no way of preparing for. He had never been able to entirely predict Will, but he was going to do his best in preparing for what Hannibal saw were the most likely scenarios.

The first, obviously, would be that Will was coming to kill Hannibal. He might have seen too much of Hannibal in Lithuania, not liked what he saw, and combined with the rest of the pain Hannibal had put him through finally decided to put an end to things once and for all and kill Hannibal. This possibility was not new, as Will had tried to kill him before in the past, but their last meeting had raised a certain level of doubt in this future path.

_ Not your life, _ Will had said as he laid in a pool of his own blood on Hannibal’s kitchen floor.

Somewhere, in all the time Will had tried to trap him, he had changed his mind about wanting to kill Hannibal. He was truly a beautiful creature, being able to change so much and yet not change his essence.

Although Will had changed his mind about killing Hannibal before he betrayed him, Hannibal knew it was quite possible that Will had changed his mind again. Indeed, he would even expect it after he slit Abigail’s throat in front of him and left them both for the authorities to find.

Except, Will had tracked him down in Palermo and whispered the words Hannibal had been aching to hear for months.

_ I forgive you. _

Hannibal did not go to Will when he spoke those sacred words, although he wanted to. He wondered what forgiveness meant to Will, and if it would include violence.

If it did, then Hannibal would be prepared. Will’s murderous intentions had never been anything other than attractive to Hannibal, and he was excited to see what Will had in store for him. 

Hannibal leisurely walked through Boboli Gardens, meticulously planning out every possible scenario, but smiling because he knew, inevitably, that Will would surprise him. 

* * *

Will got ready for bed and climbed in the top bunk. It was quite small, but he figured that’s normal for sleeping on a train. He’d never done it before, and was unsure if he  _ could _ sleep over the rhythmic motion and sound of the train speeding down the tracks. 

Will was no stranger to sleepless nights, however. Between insomnia and nightmares, he hadn’t been getting enough sleep for years. He wondered what, if anything, would change that.

Chiyoh returned from the tiny bathroom that moment, slipping into bed underneath Will’s bunk with the grace of a cat. Will continued to stare at the ceiling of the train compartment, tucked into his covers.

“Are we obligated to talk?” Chiyoh inquired. 

Will did not move a muscle, not even to blink. “No.”

“Strange to talk so much,” Chiyoh said, ignoring him. “Not used to hearing voices outside my own head.”

Will held back a groan. He didn’t really want to talk. Unlike Chiyoh, he was content with only hearing the voices inside his own head.

“I hear voices from all directions,” Will muttered. The ones outside his own head were the unwelcome ones, usually. 

Will tried to focus on something else, and found himself still curious about Chiyoh. She was Hannibal’s family, but just how similar to him was she? Not too much, if she was so against the demise of her prisoner and so shaken up from killing him.

“At the gnawing sameness of your days, did you look at the shape of things?” Will questioned. “At what you were becoming?”

He had to ask. He had to know if someone out there was experiencing something similar to himself. Will spent hours upon hours trying to make sense of the mess inside himself, to understand what he was becoming. Frankly, he was afraid of becoming what Hannibal wanted. Partly from the nature of that becoming, but partly out of spite. He did not want to be what Hannibal wanted him to be. 

It was getting harder and harder for Will to hold onto that fear. 

“I wasn’t becoming anything,” Chiyoh exhaled. “I was standing still, exactly where he left me standing. Like taxidermy.” 

Will could relate to that. “Hollowed out, and filled with something else.”

“Not something else,” Chiyoh disagreed. “I’m not as malleable as you are.”

Will didn’t know if he should be proud or sad at that. Sad because, once again, he was alone in his experiences. Loneliness was no stranger to Will, but he still felt its sting. If he thought he could relate to Chiyoh and find a camaraderie in their shared experiences, he was wrong.

Hannibal would be proud of Will’s differences, and exalt him for being so unique. Feelings weren’t something Will could choose, but if he could, he wondered if he wouldn’t choose to be proud of his differences. For once, it might be nice to feel proud of how unique he was. He was so tired of being looked at differently for his empathy, and so tired of being ashamed of his propensity for violence.

But being proud of himself would mean accepting himself, and Will wasn’t sure if he was ready to do that. He didn’t know what  _ self _ he was becoming.

“I was violent,” Chiyoh reflected quietly, “when it was the right thing to do. But… I think you like it.”

Will closed his eyes.

“Hannibal and I…” Will whispered, “afforded each other an experience we may not otherwise have had.”

They changed each other. Both Hannibal and Will had gone through many experiences in their lives, but it was only the experiences with each other that rocked them both, to their cores. The things they put each other through were dramatic, but they were also novel. If one thing stuck with Will from his psychology degree, it was that novelty excited people.

“If you don’t kill him, you’re afraid you’re going to become him,” Chiyoh observed.

Will opened his eyes. “Yes.”

Will used to be afraid all the time. Two years ago, he was deathly afraid of getting into killers’ heads because he was afraid he couldn’t shake them off. Then the encephalitis, and Hannibal, happened and Will was afraid he was losing his mind. That’s probably the most afraid he’d ever been. 

Once he found out the truth about Hannibal, that fear went away. Although he knew what Hannibal was, Will was never truly afraid of him. He wasn’t scared that Hannibal would kill him, because he was so consumed by wrath and determined to kill him first. 

Now, that rage and fear had faded. Will was no longer afraid of living in other killers’ heads, because he was already living in the worst one of all. Somehow, Hannibal’s mindset was more calming than horrifying. Will noticed the difference when compared to those other killers, and couldn’t decide if it was due to desensitization or Hannibal. He supposed he’d always thought the Ripper’s kills were more meaningful, more beautiful, than any other killer’s.

Will was only afraid of one thing, ever since waking up at the hospital with his stomach stitched back together. He wasn’t afraid he would die. He wasn’t afraid he wouldn’t find Hannibal. 

He was afraid that the feelings he started to listen to after his release from prison would overcome everything else he was feeling. He was afraid that he would  _ become _ , just like Hannibal wanted him to. 

“There are means of influence other than violence,” Chiyoh emphasized.

Will’s brow furrowed. What did she mean by that?

She was trying to be at least a little helpful, or else she wouldn’t have spoken at all after Will admitted his only fear. She was giving him a hint, some little strategy that Will could utilize if he wanted to fight his fear and thus, fight Hannibal.

Will wasn’t sure what she was referring to, though. Violence was the only language Hannibal spoke. 

Wasn’t it?

Chiyoh turned off the lights in the resounding silence and Will stared at the dark ceiling for a long time, trying to figure out what she was telling him, before he finally succumbed to sleep.

* * *

Hannibal bent over the ancient sculpture with care, delicately dusting its smooth surface in an attempt to improve the stone’s quality. He worked slowly, intently focused on his work so he wouldn’t damage the priceless artifact. It was a beautiful piece, one worthy of the utmost care.

“Dr. Fell?” A voice behind him inquired, interrupting his concentration. 

“Yes?” Hannibal answered, still bent over the statue. 

“I am Inspector Rinaldo Pazzi from the  _ Questura di Firenze. _ ” 

Hannibal’s eyebrows raised at that. The name rang a bell somewhere in his mind, and if this man was  _ Questura... _

“I was wondering if you ever met your predecessor?” Pazzi questioned. 

Hannibal breathed once, then straightened up. “Never met him. Read several of his monographs.”

He turned his face towards Pazzi and made eye contact. Hannibal was careful not to let his recognition of the other man show on his face, but Pazzi was not as shuttered. Hannibal clearly saw the surprise flash in his eyes, the recognition changing his face. It seemed Pazzi really was the young officer who had been on his tail 20 years ago, when Hannibal first visited Florence. When he first became a man. 

Hannibal turned back to his workbench, casual and relaxed if not a bit annoyed. If he remembered correctly, this man was the only member of law enforcement who had seen his face, at the Uffizi Gallery. By the time he took his suspicions back to the  _ Questura _ , Hannibal was long gone and had framed another man for his work. This man, Pazzi, was all that remained of Hannibal’s time as  _ il Mostro _ . He was the last loose end. 

Pazzi recovered from his obvious shock and tried to make his way casually towards Hannibal. “The officers who first investigated checked the  _ Palazzo _ for any sort of note — farewell notes, suicide notes — found nothing.”

“The going assumption is, he eloped with a woman. And her money,” Hannibal smiled, effortlessly shifting into the role of a charming professor.

Pazzi blinked then laughed a bit too much. 

“What is the going assumption regarding Professor Sogliato?” he asked, overly friendly. 

Hannibal was silent as he turned to fully face Pazzi. “Still no word?”

“You may have had the last words with Sogliato,” Pazzi said. Hannibal held back a smile at the man’s veiled statements.

“Your colleague,  _ Signor _ Albizzi, tells me no one has spoken to Professor Sogliato since he declined your invitation to dinner,” Pazzi continued casually. “He is the second to have disappeared from the  _ Palazzo _ .”

Pazzi’s smile was so fake Hannibal wanted to peel it off him. 

“Like any good investigator, I’m sure you’re sifting the circumstances for profit,” Hannibal replied with feigned thoughtfulness.

Pazzi nodded, his eyes boring into Hannibal. “Both were bachelors, well-respected scholars with orderly lives. They had some savings, nothing much.”

Hannibal said nothing, and a self-satisfied grin appeared on Pazzi’s face as he turned to leave.

“ _ Commendatore _ Pazzi?” Hannibal called lightly. 

Pazzi stopped. “Yes?”

“I think you are a Pazzi of  _ the _ Pazzi, am I correct?” Hannibal inquired.

Pazzi looked over his shoulder with eyes narrowed. “How did you know that?”

Hannibal smiled. “You resemble a figure from the Della Robbia roundels in your family’s chapel at Santa Croce.”

Pazzi relaxed slightly. “Yeah, yeah. That was Andrea de Pazzi depicted as John the Baptist.”

“Then there’s the most famous Pazzi of all: Francesco,” Hannibal mused. “He attempted to assassinate Lorenzo the Magnificent in the cathedral at Mass, in 1478.”

He was perfectly polite, but he wanted to feed Pazzi a little hint. It was amusing to warn the Inspector this way, by reminding him of what fate befell his ancestor. Pazzi had to know that Francesco was hanged for his crimes, and was smart enough to recognize the threat. Hannibal was turning the interrogation back on him, and making it clear that he was not a simple suspect, or even a simple killer. He was on equal footing with Pazzi, or rather reminding him that out of the two of them, Hannibal held all the power. 

“Yeah,” Pazzi nodded, the fake smile back. “The Pazzi family were all brought low on that Sunday.”

Pazzi glanced around at the antique sculptures for a moment before walking back to Hannibal. “If you come upon anything, Dr. Fell, anything personal from the missing men, will you call me?”

“Of course,  _ Commendatore _ ,” Hannibal reassured. 

The two men maintained eye contact a second more, then Pazzi nodded once and turned away, leaving Hannibal alone with his thoughts. 

Hannibal would kill this man. Not because he had to in order to contain Pazzi’s recognition, but because Hannibal wanted to. He wanted to kill the only loose end left from his time as  _ il Mostro _ . Pazzi would certainly go after the Verger bounty on Hannibal as well, and he would have to kill him as repayment for that. He was looking forward to Pazzi’s inevitable demise. 

Hannibal returned to the piece of art he was working on before, carefully brushing dirt away from the surface while pondering the different methods in which he could kill and display Pazzi.

* * *

Will’s face twitched as a drop of something wet hit his cheek. He opened his eyes blearily, blinking a few times to focus his vision on what was in front of him. Or rather, what was above him. 

Chiyoh was suspended on the ceiling above Will’s little bunk bed, impaled on a forest of antlers and hand hanging down limp like she was reaching out to him for help. Her eyes were wide open, as was her mouth in a silent scream. Will stared at her and watched her blood drip down, feeling its warmth as it splashed on his skin.

Will woke up relaxed, the cabin still dark. He checked the ceiling above him but there was no remnant of his dream, and when he checked the bunk below his own there was also no trace of Chiyoh.

He swung out of bed and shrugged into his slippers and heavy coat. As he slid out of his room and stalked down the hallway in search of his companion, he stuck his hands in his coat pockets and discovered his wallet that he had forgotten to take out the night before.

He reached the end of the train and could see Chiyoh standing out on the platform, her silk nightgown glistening like water in the dim lights. He watched her for a moment, then reached for the doorknob and let himself out into the cold night to join her in contemplation. 

The wind whipped at Will’s skin as he made himself comfortable next to her, watching the tracks speed behind the moving train. At this time of night, the darkness and the wind interacted with the moving tracks to make Will feel like he was flying.

“I like the night,” Chiyoh revealed. “It’s more than a period of time; it’s another place. It’s different from where we are during the day.”

“We’re different from who we are during the day,” Will responded. “Little more hidden, little less seen.”

Usually. That wasn’t the case with Hannibal. Will thought he would see him blind, from the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. He would know Hannibal in death, at the end of the world. The night could not obfuscate what was seen in Will’s heart.

“When life is most like a dream,” Chiyoh smiled.

Will looked at her then. “Why are you searching for him?” He studied her. “What are you hoping to find?”

Her smile was a small, private thing. “I’m not searching for Hannibal.” She turned to look straight at Will. “I know exactly where he is.”

Will’s breath hitched. “Is he in Florence?”

He needed that confirmation, to know if he was on the right path to Hannibal or if his instincts were completely wrong. It was an unlikely possibility, but one that Will was deathly afraid of because it implied that he didn’t know Hannibal as well as he thought he did. 

Will was 99% sure Hannibal was in Florence, but Chiyoh hadn’t said anything to confirm or deny that fact. If she knew, then she could tell Will and he would know for sure. The certainty of knowing Hannibal’s location was an opportunity that Will couldn’t pass up. 

“Yes,” Chiyoh said simply, and Will exhaled in relief.

But with the relief, Will was also confused. “Why didn’t you tell me you knew?”

“I told you…” Chiyoh started, moving closer to Will so that they were inches apart. “There are means of influence other than violence.”

Will’s eyebrows raised in surprise as she leaned in to kiss him, but he did nothing to stop her. The kiss was light, devoid of passion but still sweet. Chiyoh leaned back after a few moments, speaking so that her words brushed upon Will’s lips.

“But violence is all you understand.”

Before Will could move a muscle, Chiyoh reached out and shoved Will violently, pushing him over the railing, off the train, and onto the tracks below.

Will gasped as he was flung off the train into the air, and grunted in pain when he hit the ground hard. His face landed on a wooden rung, whiting out his vision, and his body ached in agony. Will lay there for a while, completely dazed and swimming in pain, before something nudged his head and his entire body twitched. 

Will groaned and tested out his aching body, finding everything hurting but nothing quite broken or sprained. He staggered to his feet and blinked the blood from his eyes, panting with exertion. As his vision stabilized, Will saw the ravenstag walking on the tracks ahead of him, leading the way. 

Will followed after it, limping and in his pajamas, but determined to get to Florence any way he could.

He walked slowly along for what seemed like hours, following the tracks and the ravenstag. Eventually the tracks crossed a main road, and Will raised his hand to shield his eyes from the headlights of an approaching car.

The car pulled alongside him and Will lowered his arm, blinking the spots away from his vision to see a man frowning at him from his open window. 

“ _ Co děláš bloudění po venkově uprostřed noci _ ? ”

Will had no idea what the man said, and didn’t even know which language he was speaking. The man sighed at his blank expression. 

“English?” he asked in a heavy accent.

“Y-Yeah,” Will replied, voice like gravel.

“I said, what are you doing wandering around countryside in middle of night?”

Will finally focused on the man’s face, seeing hard lines and sharp, but concerned, eyes.

“I…” Will floundered for an adequate excuse before his head pounded and he thought  _ fuck it. _ “I got pushed off a train. Headed to Florence.”

The man gaped at him. “Long way from Florence.” He searched Will and apparently wasn’t concerned with whatever he found, because he leaned over to push open the passenger side door. “Come.”

Will stared at the open door for a moment, not understanding that a stranger could look at  _ him _ , all bloody and battered, and offer their help. 

His headache propelled him into action, sliding into the warm car and sighing at the respite for his aching legs. Will leaned his head back against the soft fabric of the passenger seat. 

“Where are we?” he murmured.

The man put the car back into motion and glanced at him. “ Řepov . 45 minutes outside Prague.”

“The Czech Republic,” Will chuckled lightly, until he coughed. “How far is that from Florence?”

The man shrugged. “Few hours by plane, but whole day by car.”

Will hummed and closed his eyes. So far, on his first trip to Europe, he’d traveled by boat, plane, car, and train. Chioyh had been the one to suggest a train, so she could take her rifle, but Will had no such worries now. Everything he’d had remained on the train he was just so unceremoniously pushed out of. He supposed he’d take a plane now. 

He’d never been more grateful for forgetting his wallet in his coat pocket in his life.

“I’ll pay you,” Will mumbled. “Take me to Prague.”

The guy sighed and shot Will a tired look. 

“I take you to Prague,” he stated. “But not tonight, and not in _ pyžama.  _ We go tomorrow, in real clothing. Okay?”

Will’s lips twitched, and he looked down at himself. His coat was nice, but it was dirty and had a few bloodstains. His pajamas were low-quality, and Will absolutely did not want to see Hannibal again while wearing them. He needed a wardrobe change.

“Okay. Tomorrow,” Will agreed, yawning. He was tired. “I’m Will.”

“Matyáš. Sleep, Will.”

Will closed his eyes, and when he reached Matyáš’s house a few minutes later he stumbled inside, collapsed onto the couch, and was sound asleep.

* * *

Matyáš was a good man. He fed Will a simple breakfast in the morning, handed him a first aid kit and spare clothes, and directed him to his tiny bathroom. Will awoke in pain but more lucid than the night before, and was grateful for the supplies and hot shower.

Will’s wounds were a lot more visible after a shower and in the soft light of morning. He wiped the steam off the mirror and studied his injuries, hissing when he pressed too hard on a particularly tender spot. It looked like his whole body was one big, yellow and purple bruise. His back, his legs, his chest… the worst to look at, however, was probably his face.

The entire left side of his face was banged up from where he landed on the train tracks; he had a couple scabs on his forehead and multiple cuts on his cheek and neck — nothing too deep, but bad enough to stay visible for days. He had a big black eye, and a bruise on his nose that made it look like he got punched.

He was annoyed at Chiyoh for injuring him this badly, but to be honest he didn’t really blame her. Perhaps he should take being thrown off a train personally, but he knew Chiyoh was just trying to protect Hannibal. It annoyed him, because he didn’t like the idea of anyone interfering with him and Hannibal, but he understood the protective instinct. A part of Will still felt that same protective instinct for Hannibal. 

Will washed his wounds with antiseptic, grimacing, and carefully dabbed antibiotic cream on them afterwards. He ignored the rest of the first-aid kit, though. He wasn’t about to put bandaids on his entire face, and it was probably better to let the wounds breathe, anyway. He wondered if Hannibal would have cleaned him up differently, if his practiced doctor’s hands would be purely clinical as they patched up his injuries or if they would touch with reverence.

Will remembered how Hannibal touched him after Randall Tier, how he bandaged Will’s hands with care. Will had never been touched so gently before, like he was worthy of being cherished.

He quickly shook off those dangerous thoughts and slowly maneuvered into the ratty but functional clothes Matyáš kindly provided him, wincing as his muscles ached from the movement. He took one last look at his appearance, figured it was good enough until he got to Prague, and joined Matyáš outside where he was smoking a cigarette.

The older man gave him a once-over and a quick nod of approval before he stomped out his cigarette and got into his little car. Will slid in after him, and soon enough they were flying down the highway straight towards the Czech capital. They spent the drive in silence, which was perfectly fine with Will as it gave him an opportunity to look out the window at the surrounding countryside. He had never been to the Czech Republic before.

_ Hannibal and I...afforded each other an experience that we may not otherwise have had. _

They got to the city just under an hour later and Matyáš dropped him off near a respected tailor shop, at Will’s request. He pulled out a wad of cash, all American dollars, and was about to apologize for the lack of local currency when Matyáš waved him off.

“No money. I’m happy to help.” He reached out a hand, which Will shook. “Whatever in Florence…. I hope it good for you.”

Will chuckled. “I hope it’s good for me too. Thank you, Matyáš. You’re a good man.”

Matyáš smiled. “Goodbye, Will.”

“Goodbye.”

He watched as his new friend’s car spluttered down the city street and waved in farewell. Will hadn’t expected to meet anyone besides Hannibal when he got to Europe, and so far he had met three – the old woman in Lithuania, Chiyoh, and Matthias.

Will turned and walked inside the tailor shop, the little bell jingling to announce his entrance. The shop was empty save for the tailor himself, a testament to how early it still was. The tailor glanced up and took in Will’s ratty clothes with a grimace, before waddling over to help. 

“ _ Mohu vám pomoci _ ?” the guy asked. Will shook his head with a tired smile.

“English?”

“Ah.” The tailor nodded. “Can I help you, sir?”

“I need a suit,” Will explained. “Something nice, but not too formal. And… a blue dress shirt to go with it.”

The tailor chewed his lip. “If you want it today, you’ll have to buy it off the rack, but I have something that should work.”

Will smiled at him. “That sounds great, thank you.”

The guy immediately went to work, combing through the suits in his inventory to find one suitable. Will drifted to the display of dress shirts, and tried to decide on the right shade of blue. There were a lot of choices, ranging from light turquoise to dark navy. Will stared at the array of colorful shirts and swallowed.

Hannibal would probably prefer something that matched his eyes, which would be either ocean blue or midnight blue. However, Will’s pride refused to consider those as options precisely because Hannibal would like them. Instead, Will’s eyes landed on a color that he’d never worn before.

It was a mix between light blue and seafoam green, just dull enough that the color didn’t burn his eyes. It wasn’t a color that would strictly match Will’s eyes, but it was technically still blue. He figured it was a nice compromise.

Will picked up the dress shirt and turned around to see the tailor holding up a black suit and eyeing him.

“This is probably the best one for you,” he decided. “It is small and slim, but not tiny.”

Will chose not to comment on that and took the suit with his free hand. “Can I wear it out?”

The guy looked Will over. “It’s probably best if you do.”

* * *

“Can you hear me,  _ Signor _ Pazzi?”

Hannibal lightly slapped the man’s face a few times to rouse him. He hadn’t drugged him very much, just enough to strap him down to the gurney with ease. Hannibal wanted Pazzi to be awake and lucid when he killed him, but silent. Duct tape, Hannibal found from experience, was the best tool to keep mouths shut. 

“Take a deep breath while you can,” Hannibal instructed, watching Pazzi’s eyes begin to flutter. “Clear your head.”

When he was satisfied Pazzi was aware enough to follow his directions, Hannibal wheeled the officer to the top of the balcony. His ancestor Francseco had been hanged from the  _ Palazzo _ , and it was only fitting that the man kept up the family tradition.

Hannibal opened the big windows to make room for Pazzi and breathed in the crisp night air. It was late enough that the Palazzo was deserted, and Hannibal had always liked the intimacy of being alone with his prey.... Although he wondered if he would also enjoy sharing that intimacy with another. The thought brought back the melancholy he had been trying to fight for eight months, to no avail. 

As Hannibal gazed out into the darkness, he realized something and turned back to smirk at Pazzi. “I haven’t had a bite all day.”

“Actually,” Hannibal continued, “your liver and kidneys would be suitable for dinner right away. Tonight even,” he mused as he took a power cord laying around and started looping it into a noose. “But the rest of the meat should hang at least a week in the current cool conditions.”

Pazzi side-eyed him and Hannibal found his spirits lifted. “I didn’t see the forecast, did you?”

Hannibal smiled at Pazzi’s inability to respond. “I gather that means ‘no.’ If you tell me what I need to know,  _ Commendatore _ , it would be convenient for me to leave without my meal.” Hannibal worked on the noose some more, making sure it was sturdy enough to hold Pazzi’s weight. “I will ask you the questions, and then we’ll see.”

“You can trust me, you know,” Hannibal continued. “Though I expect you find trust difficult, knowing yourself. When the police didn’t come, it was clear you had sold me. Was it Mason Verger you sold me to?”

To Hannibal’s delight, Pazzi managed to nod.

“Thank you,” he said politely. “I called the number on his wanted site once, far from here, just for fun.” Hannibal smiled widely, remembering how enjoyable that exchange was. It would have been so easy to give Mason a false lead, although Hannibal had no real need to do so. Mason Verger was a pig, and Hannibal did not fear pigs.

He finished the noose and secured it around Pazzi’s neck. “Have you told anyone at the  _ Questura _ about me?”

Pazzi moved his head.

“Was that a no?”

Pazzi started breathing heavily and he was saved from any further questioning when his cell phone rang.

“Excuse me,” Hannibal told him, answering the phone. “ _ Pronto _ .”

“Inspector Pazzi. My name is Alana Bloom. You don’t know me, but I know your benefactor — ”

“Hello Alana,” Hannibal responded lightly. He was unaware that Alana had joined forces with Mason Verger, but he was impressed. Good for her, to be so headstrong in her recovery to seek revenge. Not that she would obtain it. “I’m afraid the inspector is otherwise occupied.”

There was a shocked pause. 

“Is he dead?” Alana stuttered out. Hannibal smiled.

“There is nothing I’d love more than to be able to chat with you, Alana, but you caught me at a rather awkward moment. Nice to hear your voice.”

He hung up the phone and turned his attention back to Pazzi. “So,  _ Commendatore, _ which do you think?” Hannibal unbuttoned the man’s suit to expose his abdomen. “Bowels in, or bowels out?”

Hannibal took out his Harpy knife and snapped it open. “Out, I think.”

He plunged the blade into Pazzi’s soft flesh and dragged it down the entirety of his lower torso, intentionally cutting much deeper than when he had cut Will. In the next moment, Hannibal swiftly tipped Pazzi out of the window.

The inspector plummeted off the balcony and a split-second later the cable noose around his neck could extend no further and pulled taut, halting Pazzi’s descent and breaking his neck with a loud  _ CRACK. _ He swayed, dead, from the force of his violent descent as his innards splattered down upon the smooth stone below him.

Hannibal looked over the edge of the balcony to assess his work, and a figure looked up at him. He was a tad surprised to see Jack Crawford, but not altogether shocked. He must have been working with Pazzi.

Hannibal was pleased that he was not working with Will. It seemed that Will was on his own journey, and wanted Jack to have no part of it. It was about time Will distanced himself from Jack, Hannibal thought with pride.

Hannibal titled his head and waited for Jack to make the first move. He did so not a moment later, rushing into the  _ Palazzo _ after Hannibal instead of taking the safer route and calling the  _ polizia _ . Hannibal smirked, happy that he had another opportunity to fight Jack. The last one had gone in his favor, and he was curious to see what this rematch would entail. 

Hannibal returned to his workroom with all the torture instruments at a brisk pace. His instincts sensed Jack’s presence already in the room, and his nose confirmed it.

“Hello Jack,” Hannibal said, scanning the room for any glimpse of his former friend. “Did you get my note?”

He reached into his pocket and silently unfolded his knife.

“I am truly sorry about Bella,” Hannibal murmured. “For her, night and day must have been very much the same in the end.”

He was being honest in his condolences, but he was also using them to make Jack enraged and reveal himself. It was a strategy Hannibal employed frequently; using his honest feelings to manipulate people. He’d done it with Will countless times, before he realized that Will was doing the same.

Hannibal prowled into the room. “When she could no longer stir or speak, did you speak for her?” He paused to check for signs of Jack's location, then continued when he found none. “I imagine you were capable of giving any medication Bella may have needed in the night.”

No sounds at that, either.

“Did you practice injections on an orange, Jack?”

That got him a response; music started coming from his record-player behind him. Hannibal turned in its direction, eyes sharp for his prey.

“What medication did you give her in the end?” Hannibal asked. “Was it too much? Or just enough?”

From behind, Jack grabbed his shoulder and shoved him through the closest display case. Glass shattered and Hannibal landed hard, snarling slightly at Jack’s ability to sneak up on him. He had learned something after their last encounter.

Hannibal stood up, only to have Jack kick him in the chest and propel him through the back of the glass case. Pain enveloped Hannibal’s back as he broke the glass and hit the floor with a smack. He lay there, winded, and received a hard punch once he tried to get up.

Blood dripped out of Hannibal’s mouth and he crawled towards his knife, which had flown out of his hand on his second trip through glass. Before he could reach his blade, however, Jack slammed down an antique torture hook in his leg.

Hannibal cried out in pain and kicked with his uninjured leg as Jack dragged him backwards, away from the knife, but Jack dodged his kick and punched him a few more times. After a particularly brutal blow, Hannibal landed on his back again. He smiled through the pain and the blood in his mouth, grabbing onto Jack when the man hauled him up.

His efforts did not pay off, however, and Jack threw him a few yards away near the breaking wheel. Hannibal’s head was spinning at this point from all the blows, but he made sure to yank the hook out of his leg. More pain raced up his leg, and before he could pull himself together Jack punched him again, this time Hannibal falling backwards and half-landing into the breaking wheel with its force. Jack took advantage of his position and pushed on the wheel, straining Hannibal’s arm but not quite breaking it. Hannibal panted loudly but did not scream.

“I brought Bella back from death, and you returned her to it,” Hannibal laughed, not the least bit concerned with the pain. “Is that where you’re taking me, Jack?”

Jack punched him again, and Hannibal knew the answer was yes.

He collapsed onto the floor, his arm now released from the breaking wheel. Jack hauled him up again, hit him a few more times, and Hannibal was able to crawl to the balcony ledge where he had just said goodbye to Inspector Pazzi. Jack let him go, taking his time to retrieve the meat hook he previously stuck in Hannibal’s leg. Hannibal wondered where he planned to stick it this time.

Hannibal panted hard, each breath causing him pain. His entire body burned, but he was not afraid to die. If Jack killed him, Hannibal would be proud of him. He only wished it was Will who managed to kill him, instead.

“How will you feel when I’m gone?” Hannibal wondered.

Through his swollen eye, he could make out Jack’s smile. 

“Alive,” he relished, and smacked Hannibal’s face with the meat hook.

Hannibal tumbled backwards out of the window, grabbing onto the first thing he touched. Pazzi’s shirt was wet with blood, but Hannibal made his way down the man’s dead body until he could hold on no longer and let go, dropping the last eight feet to the ground.

The landing left him winded, but Hannibal got to his feet, gave Jack one last look, and staggered away into the dawn very much alive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter will be Dolce, which is so emotional so it'll probably take me about two weeks. I really appreciate everyone's comments and support, they keep me going <3


	6. Dolce Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “If I saw you everyday, forever, Will, I would remember this time,” Hannibal murmured, eyes soft.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I decided to split this episode in half because, as I was getting close to the end, I realized the chapter was getting to be like 10k hahaha so I figured I'd split it in half to make it easier to digest and also, I'm not completely done with it yet and I wanted y'all to have something today :) 
> 
> Enjoy the first part of Dolce ~

Will left the Florence airport in his new suit and suddenly realized he didn’t know where to go.

Hannibal was in this city somewhere, he was sure, but Will didn’t know exactly where he was. He would probably be living in an affluent, old part of the city, but canvassing an entire section of Florence like that would take too long. Hannibal wouldn’t need to have a job, he had enough money, but Will knew he would be unable to resist visiting the fine art or history museums, in a professional or personal capacity. After all, it was the art that made Hannibal fall in love with this city in the first place.

Will took a cab to the museum district, determined to visit every building with his eyes peeled, and somehow wasn’t surprised to see police lights and sirens centered around one of the museums.

“Stop here,” Will commanded the cab driver, almost throwing money at him in his haste to get out of the car.

Will approached the crowd behind the police line, craning his neck to catch a glimpse of what was happening. There were officers everywhere, many more than what Will would expect for the average tourist dropping dead from a heart attack, and his heart thudded at the promise of Hannibal. 

He could vaguely make out something hanging in the stone courtyard of a few buildings from his place on the street, and prowled around for a closer look. To his luck, there was a slim opening between two columns that the police hadn’t blocked off, and Will slipped through and walked leisurely towards the crime scene in his suit, trying to look like he belonged there.

He lingered in the shadows, not wanting to be seen by the police just yet, and simply observed the scene in front of him. There was a man hanging from a balcony, a bright orange power cord wrapped around his neck. That in itself was too shocking and could have easily been a suicide or some random murder, except that the man’s guts had been sliced from his flesh and violently splattered onto the smooth stones of the courtyard.

Will’s eyes widened at the bloody scene in the morning light, and he knew this couldn’t be a coincidence. Police were swarming the place like ants hungry for a cookie crumble and there was a body, bowels out, right where Will expected to find Hannibal. He closed his eyes, and clearly imagined Hannibal putting the noose around the man’s neck, cutting him open, and shoving him off the balcony. This was judgement, and punishment. This was Hannibal’s design.

“Cut him down already,” a familiar voice growled. “You’ve taken enough pictures!”

Will opened his eyes and couldn’t help the smile twitching at his lips. If Jack Crawford was here, then this was certainly Hannibal’s work. He probably picked up the trail in Palermo, and somehow followed Hannibal here. Somehow...

Will narrowed his eyes at the body as they cut it down, finally making out the man’s face, and understood. It was Pazzi, and he had apparently enlisted Jack’s help to catch Hannibal when he couldn’t get Will’s.

It looked as if Will was right, and Hannibal had killed Pazzi after all. 

“Jack,” Will called, stepping out of the shadows. Jack turned, looking older than Will remembered and perhaps a bit more ruffled. He wasn’t wearing a tie, and his shirt was untucked. Will was one to talk, since half his face was an open wound. He had an excuse though, he got pushed off a train — he wondered what Jack’s excuse was. 

They shook hands like old friends, although Will wasn’t sure that’s what they were anymore.

“I’m not surprised to see you here,” Jack sighed. “I’m just surprised I found him before you.”

Will bit back the dark chuckle that threatened to spill out of him, remembering how it felt to be inches away from Hannibal in the catacombs below the Norman Chapel.  _ You didn’t.  _

“What happened?” Will asked, trying to focus on the Hannibal of a few hours ago instead of the Hannibal of a few days ago.

“I think that’s fairly obvious, Will. What isn’t obvious is where you’ve been all this time,” Jack said, studying his face. “Pazzi told me you were in Palermo, before I got there. He said you left.”

“I did leave,” Will replied coolly, avoiding the question. “Hannibal wasn’t there.”

“No,” Jack exhaled. “He was here. Pazzi ran into him accidentally, almost as if it was fate. He was working as a museum curator at the Palazzo here, assuming the identity of British professor Roman Fell.”

Will hummed, not surprised. “Hannibal recognized Pazzi from 20 years ago, and killed him.”

“Yes,” Jack confirmed.

Will’s gaze drifted back to the pile of intestines and inner organs, deflated and stinking, on the ground a few yards away. “You said you saw him?”

“I fought him,” Jack corrected. Will’s gaze snapped back to Jack and the older man started walking towards the nearest building. “Let me show you.”

Will followed him into the museum where Hannibal worked, up the stairs and into an exhibit room full of medieval torture equipment. He didn’t need to ask to know that the entire collection was Hannibal’s pet project. 

Before WIll could fully take in his surroundings, Jack handed him an old wooden carving. Will examined it, taking in the visage of a hanged man with his guts spilling out and the word Pazzi engraved below him. Will traced the lines of the wooden man’s arms with his fingers and remained silent. This was Hannibal’s inspiration for Pazzi’s death, a family tradition of judgement and punishment. Hannibal must have been so pleased to be able to finally recreate the image, Will could almost  _ see _ his fucking smirk.

Will looked up from the carving with an undefined ache and scanned the room where Hannibal worked.

Various torture instruments lay scattered or exposed, obviously out of their intended places. There was shattered glass on the floor, and smears of blood everywhere. It was evident that there had been a fight, but Jack didn’t look beat up. Will turned to look at him with a raised eyebrow, and Jack nodded.

“He’s wounded… and he’s worried.”

Will sighed and reached out to touch one of the torture devices that had come loose in the fight, a sort of hook that really wasn’t Hannibal’s style. Will set it back in its place anyway. “Hannibal doesn’t worry. Knowing he’s in danger won’t rattle him any more than killing does.”

Jack was silent for a moment. “If Rinaldo Pazzi had decided to do his duty as an officer of the law, he would have determined very quickly that he was Hannibal Lecter. Would have taken less than 30 minutes to get a warrant.”

“All those resources were denied to Pazzi,” Will pointed out, walking to the other side of the room towards the larger torture instruments. “As soon as he decided to sell Hannibal, he became a bounty hunter.”

“Outside the law and alone,” Jack murmured.

Will hummed, slowly prowling behind Jack.

“Well, here we are. Outside the law and alone,” Jack stated.

Will wanted to smile _. Again. _

“Have you told  _ la polizia  _ they’re looking for Hannibal Lecter?” Will said instead.

Jack hesitated. “They’re motivated to find Dr. Fell inside the law. Knowing who he is, what he’s worth, it’ll just coax them out of bounds.” Just like Pazzi. 

“That’d be a free for all,” Will agreed.

“And Hannibal will slip away,” Jack grumbled. 

There was loaded silence as Jack glanced at the ground, then looked back up at Will. 

“Will you slip away with him?”

Will met his gaze directly. The man looked disapproving, but under that Will could detect a layer of concern. Whether it was concern for Will’s well-being or concern that he would help Hannibal escape, Will couldn’t be sure. He thought back to a few months ago, when Jack visited him in Wolf Trap and Will was still broken enough to reveal more than he intended about what happened that night in Hannibal’s kitchen.

Will was more confident as he asserted his feelings this time. “Part of me will always want to.”

It was something he’d come to accept, that part of him that rejoiced in the darkness and was hopelessly drawn to Hannibal. It wasn’t something Hannibal created, it was something already living inside Will that Hannibal spoke to, pushed, and cultivated. Will cultivated it too, with every life he took and every fantasy of Hannibal.

“You have to cut that part out,” Jack warned.

This time, Will couldn’t contain the chuckle that fell from his lips. Will didn’t think it was possible to cut that part of himself out. It was ingrained into who he was, it always had been, and although he tried to resist listening to it, on occasion he found himself giving into the dark impulses more frequently. He was holding onto the various social constructions of morality by a thread, at this point.

Will did want to tear that part out, sometimes. Hannibal was buried so deeply inside that violent space that Will couldn’t help but want to tear it open and burn the entire thing, just to cleanse himself of Hannibal’s influence. Anything to be free of Hannibal’s tight grip on his mind, and on his heart. He hated Hannibal for everything he put Will through, for how much he lied and hurt him, but…

Will forgave him. It wasn’t something he could control, it was just something that happened. He didn’t know if it was the growing darkness inside him, or the light, or the countless shades of gray, but Will had forgiven Hannibal for his transgressions. He couldn’t control his feelings, and he knew that nothing he did would work in severing his connection from Hannibal. Even if he ignored it, it would always be there, lingering in the back of his mind and behind his teeth.

He had wanted to run away with Hannibal then, he wanted to run away with Hannibal now, and Will knew he would still want to run away with Hannibal far into the future. He couldn’t control the wanting, but Will could control what he did about it.

The thing was, he was still unsure of what  _ to do _ about it.

Will turned away from Jack and changed the subject. “No, of course you found him here. Not because of the exhibit, but because of the crowd it attracts.”

He walked in front of one of the only intact display cases, admiring the starvation cage within. It was in the shape of a man, and as Will stared at it he could imagine himself trapped inside.

“You had him Jack. He was beaten. Why didn’t you kill him?” Will asked, curious.

Jack sighed. “Maybe I need you to.”

Will wanted to laugh again. “Did you not talk to Pazzi at all? I thought I made it very clear that I am undecided on that matter.”

“I know you’re undecided,” Jack dismissed. “That’s exactly why you need to be the one to do it.”

Will closed his eyes. “Cut off the head of the snake…”

“And the body follows,” Jack finished. “Cut him  _ out _ , Will.”

Will took a shuddering breath. “I can’t promise anything, Jack, but...I’ll try.”

And he will try. God, Will’s been trying to fight back against Hannibal for so long now that he doesn’t know how to interact with the man without wanting to hurt him. Will knew he’d try to hurt Hannibal when he saw him again, but he also knew… his mind would be screaming at him the entire time, begging him not to do it. Will was unsure which voice in his conflicted heart would win and that uncertainty made him worry, but it was also starting to wear him down. He was getting tired of constantly analyzing himself and trying to predict his behavior when the uncertainties were growing and making it harder and harder to do. 

“We have his cover name,” Jack said, mercifully dropping the subject for now. “Pazzi left me his notes on him. If we hurry, we can get to his apartment before  _ la polizia  _ bust in.”

“Bedelia is with him.” It wasn’t a question.

Jack nods anyway. “They’re posing as a married couple.”

Will takes a deep breath to calm an unexpected spike of rage and opens his eyes.

“Let’s go pay the happy couple a visit.”

* * *

Hannibal slouched on the balcony with his sketchbook, enjoying the view of old-town Florence. He didn’t move a lot, since his wounds were very fresh and still healing, but that did not impact the quality of his drawing. He was satisfied with his recreation of the Florence landscape, aware that this would likely be the last time he had the chance to do so with the model in front of him.

“I want to be able to draw these streets from memory,” he told Bedelia as she approached and glanced at his sketchbook. “I want to be able to draw the  _ Palazzo Vecchio, _ and the Duomo.”

He looked out at the city of his youth and mentally categorized every building, every roof he could see into his mind palace.

“You won’t be coming back here for a very long time,” Bedelia sighed, gently taking the sketchbook out of Hannibal’s hands.

“Memories of Florence will be all I have,” Hannibal agreed. He glanced at Bedelia before looking back at the skyline. “Florence is where I became a man.” Hannibal smiled, it was quite poetic when he thought about it. “I see my end in my beginning.”

“All of our endings can be found in our beginnings,” Bedelia mused, walking away from the balcony and back into the apartment. “History repeats itself, and there is no escape.”

Hannibal followed her, limping lightly and ignoring the pain that surfaced with every step. There were some bags laid out on the dining table, two small duffels to be exact.

“You’ve packed lightly,” he observed.

“I’ve packed for you,” Bedelia replied airily. Hannibal raised his eyebrows, and Bedelia turned to face him. “This is where I leave you. Or, more accurately, where you leave me.”

Bedelia had once again managed to impress him. She was making a valiant effort to seem like she did not fear him, and if her voice did not shake when she was speaking Hannibal might’ve even been tempted to believe her.

“This isn’t how I intended to say goodbye,” Hannibal noted. “I imagined it differently.”

He watched in delight as Bedelia gulped.

“I didn’t,” she responded, stepping towards him on shaky legs, using the dining chairs as support. “I knew that you intended to eat me, and I knew that you had no intention of eating me hastily.”

Hannibal smiled slightly. “Would be a shame not to savor you.”

Bedelia stopped inches away and craned her neck up to look at him. “I have not marinated long enough for your tastes. When they come for you…”

“And they will come,” Hannibal reflected.

“What will you say of me?” Bedelia inquired softly.

Hannibal tilted his head. “I will help you tell the version of events you want to be told. I will help you because you asked me to.”

Bedelia leaned up closer and her eyes sparkled. “You may make a meal of me yet, Hannibal...”

She gently closed the distance between their lips, and Hannibal’s eyes fell shut to enjoy what he imagined would be the last time he felt her touch. She pulled back a moment later, although Hannibal noticed with his nose, smirking, that it wasn’t from lack of arousal.

“... but not today,” she whispered.

Hannibal watched with amusement as Bedelia retreated to the bathroom, leaving him alone to make a graceful exit. The apartment was never home, Hannibal mused as he glanced at the master bedroom. It functioned more like purgatory, an in between place where he resided, waiting, until Will found him again.

It wouldn’t be long now. Hannibal was exposed, quite by design, and it was only a matter of time until Will appeared and dragged him out of purgatory and into either heaven or hell. He was excited to find out which it would be, which plan he would enact as a response to Will’s actions. But more than anything, Hannibal realized, more than what they might do to each other…

He was excited to simply see Will again. 

Hannibal’s hands reached for the bags, unzipping to reveal a few changes of clothes and toiletries. Predictably, the clothes were only his, and Hannibal nodded to himself before grabbing hold of the bag and gingerly making his way towards the master bedroom.

He had been avoiding this room ever since he arrived in Florence, with the exception of a few occasions in which he had needed space to regulate his emotions or feel closer to Will. Presently, Hannibal did not linger in his melancholy and instead made his way directly to the large wardrobe situated on the wall opposite to the equally large bed. He moved slowly to open the heavy doors of the wardrobe, mindful of his injuries, and pushed back the hangers on the right side of the wardrobe to better examine the clothes on the left side.

Will’s clothes were in pristine condition, which was expected because they had never been worn. Hannibal reached out and touched the soft fabric of the first shirt, a white button-down. He never got the chance to see Will in white, but Hannibal imagined he’d look beautiful.

Hannibal sighed, then took the white shirt, along with some pants and undergarments, and added them to his bag of clothes. It never hurt to be prepared, after all.

He turned away from the wardrobe, scanned the master bedroom one last time, and nodded. There was nothing left for him here except the ghosts of the past. He had places to be, and people to see.

Hannibal walked out of his Florence apartment for the last time with his head held high, closing the door behind him with a soft  _ click _ .

* * *

Jack knocked hard on the Fell’s apartment door, and Will was surprised he didn’t just bust in unannounced. They had hurried to Hannibal’s hideout together, making a slight detour on the way. Will spied a knife shop at the edge of the museum district and stopped in the middle of the street, realizing with a laugh that he was going to meet Hannibal and didn’t have a weapon.

Jack understood his hesitation immediately and said nothing as they walked into the store together, bought what they needed, and were quickly on their way again. The knife was a reassuring weight in Will’s pocket, giving him a sense of security that may have been misplaced. 

Will still wasn’t sure what was going to happen, but the knife was a nice option to have. He knew he wouldn’t use it to kill Hannibal, but he might use it to hurt him. Hannibal had left Will with a scar, and Will wanted to return the favor.

_ You fantasize about killing me.  _

_ Yes.  _

_ Tell me, how would you do it? _

_ With my hands. _

Will had not changed his mind since that conversation. He wanted to wring Hannibal’s neck, to straddle him while he squeezed his throat and watched his face turn purple. A gun, a knife, any other method was too impersonal and wouldn’t be a just punishment. If Will was going to kill Hannibal, it would be with his own hands.

Jack banged on the door again, and Will heard soft shuffling sounds from inside the apartment. The two men exchanged a look, and Will was ready. He was ready to see Hannibal again.

He was not ready for the door to open and to feel a rush of rage at the sight of Bedelia du Maurier peering up at him.

“Mrs. Fell, I presume?” Will spat out.

Hannibal was not here. If he were, he would have answered the door himself, proud to face whatever Will had to throw at him. But Bedelia was here instead, Hannibal was gone again, and Will was pissed.

Bedelia opened the door wide, a silent invitation to enter, and turned away to wander back into the apartment. Will and Jack stepped across the threshold and Will’s brow furrowed as he watched Bedelia walk on unsteady legs to the living area and plop down on a lounge chair.

“She’s high,” he muttered to Jack. Jack nodded to Will and pointed to a few vials on the table that had escaped Will’s attention. They both followed Bedelia into the living room, and Jack picked up one of the vials to study it further. 

“My husband is a doctor,” Bedelia explained, splayed loosely onto the chair. “He’s been treating my condition.”

“And what condition is that…  _ Mrs. Fell _ ?” Jack asked sarcastically.

“I get confused,” Bedelia replied lightly. Will felt another surge of anger rush through him.

“Oh, please,” Will sassed. “You need to get over yourself. Whatever  _ self _ that is, Bedelia.”

Bedelia narrowed her eyes at him. “My name is Lydia Fell.”

Will chuckled darkly, a little unsure where his anger was coming from but very aware of it thrumming through his body. “You expect us to believe that you somehow lost yourself in the  _ hot darkness _ of Hannibal Lecter’s mind? That Lydia Fell is some construct?”

Jack, also obviously annoyed at Bedelia’s performance, got out his phone and brought up a picture of Bedelia’s missing person report. “It’s you, isn’t it?”

Bedelia visibly struggled to focus on the picture through her drug-induced fog and frowned. “Well, now I’m really confused.”

Will huffed another angry laugh and leaned on the arm of Bedelia’s chair, hovering over her with a sharp smile. He spoke slowly, making sure Bedelia understood the meaning of his words. “I….don’t...believe you.”

It’s a mockery of the words she said to him in the BSHCI, and Will could tell she understood as she lolled her head to the side to look at him. Bedelia had rightfully believed him then, and Will was rightfully seeing through her lies now.

“You are not confused,  _ Bedelia _ ,” Jack stressed.

“That is not my name,” Bedelia replied with a lazy smile.

“Oh, you know who you are and what you’ve done,” Will jeered. “And you know exactly how you’re going to wiggle out of it.” He walked over to the vials of drugs and picked one up. “What is this? Sedatives? Hypnotics? Ethanol? Scopolamine? Midazolam?”

“Same cocktail Dr. Lecter served Miriam Lass,” Jack guessed. “You’ve been freebasing your alibi.” Jack sighed. “And I’m not even mad at you. To tell the truth, I’m fairly impressed.”

Will snorted. He was not impressed at all, and he was plenty mad.

“Mostly because you’re still alive,” Will cut in, still speaking in that mocking tone. “When this fog of yours clears, I’d love to hear how you managed that.”

What was so special about Bedelia? What did Hannibal see in her that he didn’t see in Will? Will hated that she could get so close to Hannibal and come out unscathed. He was beyond pissed that she was given that opportunity and simply  _ chose _ to step away from it — like it was some common gift and not something sacred, something rare, something that Will had  _ bled  _ for.

“You say my husband--” 

Will bared his teeth at the word. 

“--murdered a chief investigator. Where is the  _ polizia _ ? Shouldn’t they be questioning me?”

“Don’t worry,” Jack said, sitting in a chair across from Bedelia and cutting off his line of sight to Will and the front door. “They will.”

“They sure are taking their time,” Bedelia noted. “What could possibly be the delay?”

Will locked eyes with her and realized with annoyance that she wasn’t going to give him any real answers, not now. If Will wanted to find Hannibal, he’d have to do so himself. On his own, like he planned in the first place.

Will silently turned away from Bedelia, walking out of the apartment and back into the Florence afternoon sunlight. He left Jack behind as well, not wanting any more extra people involved in what was supposed to be an intimate affair between Will and Hannibal. He was sick of Bedelia taunting him, he was sick of Jack pushing him, he was sick of all the obstacles he had to overcome to find Hannibal again.

He took a deep breath and started walking back towards the museum district. Will knew Hannibal like he knew himself, and he knew without a doubt where Hannibal would go after leaving the shattered sanctuary of his luxury apartment. He would go to the place that had entranced him all those years ago, as a young man becoming.

The Uffizi Gallery was a beautiful building in the center of the museum district, but Will barely admired the outside of it as he hurried inside, fighting his way through the mass exodus of tourists. He slapped some money on the ticket counter and the teenage clerk regarded him wearily.

“We’re about to close,” the kid said in heavily accented English.

“But you’re not closed yet,” Will pointed out.

The teen rolled his eyes but collected Will’s money and shoved a ticket at him. Will exhaled in relief. 

“ _ La Primavera _ ?” he inquired.

The kid sighed, not caring anymore about the bruised American eager to enter the gallery. “Second hallway to the right.”

Will nodded at him, composed himself, and strolled into the exhibit hall, following the strong pull to Hannibal. His body itched to simultaneously race towards Hannibal and bolt as far away as possible, but Will consciously made the decision to walk forward at a normal pace. 

He turned the corner and was struck by the vivid colors of the  _ Primavera _ , a much larger painting than he expected, on the far wall. He took a deep breath and walked closer, eyes falling to the lone man sitting on the bench in front of the Botticelli.

Hannibal was sketching, just like Will imagined he would be. As Will approached slowly, he could make out fresh wounds on one side of Hannibal’s face, not unlike the ones on Will’s own face.

Sitting down on the bench next to him was the easiest choice Will ever made, even if he groaned from the creaking of his bruised limbs. He turned, and met Hannibal’s eyes for the first time in over eight months. Hannibal was smiling at him, and Will’s lips quirked, and it felt like home. 

Will sighed, soaking in the moment, and then Hannibal said something that Will would remember to his dying day.

“If I saw you everyday, forever, Will, I would remember this time,” Hannibal murmured, eyes soft.

Will let out a genuinely happy laugh and smiled wider than he had in years. He couldn’t begin to articulate an adequate response to that through how warm he suddenly felt inside. He could practically feel the bond connecting them, as if it was a physical thing linking their insides together. Will sighed again, feeling all the tension built up from the past year and all the anger from today he had at Bedelia drain out of his body in one moment.

“Strange, seeing you here in front of me,” Will confessed. “Been staring at afterimages of you in places you haven’t been in years.”

Hannibal hummed, and they both glanced at the painting before them. Will thought it was beautiful, and he wished he could’ve seen Hannibal’s recreation of it all those years ago. It was probably Hannibal’s first real work of art, and Will hated that he hadn’t been able to see it in person.

“To market, to market, to buy a fat pig. Home again, home again, jiggity jig.”

Will laughed again. Hannibal had never made jokes before, when he wore his person suit in Baltimore. He felt incredibly blessed that even after all they’d been through, Hannibal was joking with him now. He was comfortable enough to let Will see this side of him, after all this time spent apart. Will could understand, because in that moment he felt flayed open and raw, like he couldn’t hide anything even if he tried to.

“I wanted to understand you, before I laid eyes on you again,” Will murmured. “I needed it to be clear...what I was seeing.”

He looked at Hannibal’s face again, looked in his sparkling dark eyes and found the clarity that he had worked so hard to find. Hannibal was bare to him, and Will understood him more than he even understood himself.

Hannibal stared back at him and smiled softly. “Where does the difference between the past and the future come from?”

“Mine?” Will asked, brow furrowing. “Before you, and after you. Yours? It’s all starting to bur.”

Time was relative to each person, and they were no exception. Hannibal was a force of nature in Will’s life, and his sense of time revolved around Hannibal’s presence. Since Will knew all of Hannibal now, he knew that Hannibal didn’t differentiate events according to when they occurred. For Hannibal, events in his childhood were just as fresh as if they had happened yesterday.

“Mischa. Abigail. Chiyoh,” Will whispered. They were all parts of Hannibal, blended together to make him into what he was today. What he had always been.

“How is Chiyoh?” Hannibal inquired. 

“She pushed me off a train,” Will offered.

He could feel Hannibal’s smile without having to turn his head. “Atta girl.”

Will closed his eyes briefly, knowing that he had to breach the mess between them, the mess that Will still didn’t know what he was going to do about.

“You and I… have begun to blur,” Will exhaled.

Hannibal was silent for a beat. “Isn’t that how you found me?”

Will knew it would be like this. He knew that Hannibal would see beauty where he saw horror. Codependency did help Will find him, but the price was high.

“Every crime of yours feels like one I am guilty of,” Will whispered. “Not just Abigail’s murder, every murder… stretching backward and forward in time.”

Will glanced at Hannibal out of the corner of his eye and caught his gaze.

“Freeing yourself from me, and me freeing myself from you,” Hannibal assessed. “They’re the same.”

Will nodded, tilting his head closer to Hannibal. “We’re conjoined. I’m curious whether either of us can… survive separation.”

Hannibal digested his words and held his gaze. In the back of his mind, Will wondered if this was the longest time he’d ever locked eyes with someone else. It sure felt like it.

They had been physically separated for almost a year, but that had done nothing to change their level of codependency since they had been focused on each other the entire time. Will was curious if they could truly live apart — not live for each other — and survive it.

“Now is the hardest test,” Hannibal speculated. “Not letting rage and frustration, nor forgiveness, keep you from thinking.”

Will studied him, wondering what Hannibal hoped he would think, and decide, and do. He’d probably thought out every possibility just to be prepared, but Will could waste no energy wondering about Hannibal’s actions when he was so preoccupied with determining his own.

After a charged moment, Hannibal broke their gaze, closed his sketchbook, and stood.

“Shall we?” he proposed.

Will stood as well, groaning again with the strain on his muscles. If Hannibal wanted Will to decide on a course of action, he would. He knew Hannibal was curious what he would do, if he would be able to predict it. Will was curious as well. Like Hannibal, he couldn’t predict his own behavior. Not when it came to the man standing next to him.

“After you,” Will granted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What did y'all think?? I was so soft when writing the gallery scene, that's literally one of my favorite scenes in the whole show...
> 
> Part 2 will be up in a few days probably, and it will have a lot of missing scenes to better explain what happened after...the gallery scene... hehehehe Y'all will love it <3


	7. Dolce Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Don’t worry,” Hannibal murmured. “I’m cleaning the blood off you.”
> 
> Will’s eyes opened halfway and he lolled his head down to look at himself in the tub, the most movement he was allowed by the drugs coursing through his system.
> 
> “Issa bad ‘scuse,” Will slurred. “You jus’ want me naked.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time for the last half of Dolce!! This chapter includes A TON of missing scenes (Hannibal giving drugged up Will a bath, among others hehehe). I hope you like it! <3

They walked out of the Uffizi together slowly, still at the mercy of their respective wounds. Will refrained from looking at Hannibal, the simple feeling of his presence beside him enough to energize Will and inspire him to action. He felt so alive with Hannibal next to him, making the looming decision of what to do much easier. He fingered the knife in his pocket and thought about the last time a blade was involved between them, the last time they were together.

Hannibal had  _ gutted _ him and left him bleeding out on the floor without a second glance. Will was scarred deeply by Hannibal, in more ways than one, and he realized he wanted to scar Hannibal back. He was always so untouchable, and Will resented the fact that he didn’t have a physical scar on him that marked his betrayal, like Will did.

If Hannibal wanted to push Will into action, then so be it.

In that moment, he knew he couldn’t kill Hannibal. Killing him would be like killing himself, and in spite of Jack’s goading to do just that, Will didn’t want to. He did, however, want to stab Hannibal in the shoulder so deeply that he gets branded with the scar forever. Just like Will. 

They barely saw anyone as they limped out of the gallery and into the fading light of the beautiful  _ Piazzale degli Uffizi _ , and Will felt secure enough to grab hold of the knife. He felt every one of his heavy steps on the pavement in his chest like a heartbeat, and after a deep breath withdrew the sharp blade from his pocket, turning slightly towards Hannibal with the intent to stab him quickly but forcefully. 

Suddenly, before Will could move another muscle, a piercing pain shot through his right shoulder. The entire right side of his upper body erupted in fire and Will fell backwards, choking on his cry of pain. He felt a firm arm catch him before he could completely collapse, eliciting another sound of agony from Will as the fire in his shoulder burned hotter.

Will breathed heavily as he realized he’d been shot, and clenched his teeth when Hannibal threw his uninjured arm over his shoulder and forced Will to move forward. He could barely think with his head swimming in pain and automatically followed Hannibal, leaning on him heavily for support.

Will’s feet were almost dragging on the pavement but somehow, after an indeterminable amount of time of Hannibal supporting him, they crossed the threshold of a building and stumbled into the elevator. 

Once stationary inside the elevator, the adrenaline that had been fueling Will’s body rushed out all at once and he slumped against Hannibal completely. The pain was so blinding he felt like he was going to pass out. The only thing registering in Will’s mind other than the pain was the physical sensation of Hannibal breathing hard on his neck from the strain of carrying him.

“Almost there,” Hannibal panted. “Stay with me, Will.”

Will wanted to smile, but he was rapidly losing control over his muscles. 

“Where else would I go?”

Hannibal’s arm tightened around his waist before the elevator dinged, and Will grunted in pain once more as he was dragged out of the small space and into a lavish hallway. It seemed as if their momentary rest in the elevator energized Hannibal, and he did not hesitate for a second in opening a door at the end of the long hallway and helping Will inside. 

By this point Will was very dizzy, both from the agony of his wound and, he suspected, the blood loss. It was only when Hannibal deposited him on the couch that Will became aware of blood soaking his shoulder and arm, making his new suit stick uncomfortably to his skin. He felt minimally better reclining on the couch, but Will was still panting and groaning in pain. It had been over a year since he last got shot, but the pain surpassed his worst memories

He supposed that was the difference between a pistol at close range and a sniper rifle.

Suddenly Hannibal was in front of him again, holding a glass of water to his lips. Will drank as best he could through his heavy breathing, grateful for the hand on the back of his neck helping him move. All strength had left him with the blood he was steadily losing, and Will was vaguely aware that if his gunshot wound wasn’t stitched up soon then he would need a blood transfusion. 

“This is gonna hurt,” Hannibal warned as he removed the glass of water. “The bullet is still inside you.”

There was no time to protest before Hannibal reached for Will and tugged his suit jacket halfway down his back with one smooth motion. The movement jostled Will’s shoulder and he cried out, shaking and unbalanced. Hannibal quickly pulled Will into his chest to steady him, tucking his head onto his shoulder and pressing his hand against the back of his neck to keep him still. Will huffed onto Hannibal’s throat and in his daze remembered that the last time Hannibal held him close like this was also the last time when Will suffered incredible agony.

Hannibal held Will like that for a long moment, almost tenderly, and Will clenched his eyes shut at the rush of emotional pain that momentarily outweighed the physical pain. The physical pain spiked again, however, as Hannibal broke their embrace to lean Will back down onto the couch. Will panted and watched with heavy-lidded eyes as Hannibal started cutting his new shirt open.

“Chiyoh has always been very protective of me,” Hannibal offered.

Will laughed but it came out sounding like a wheeze. Chiyoh was overprotective and it resulted in Will getting pushed off a train and shot. It was hardly fair as Will knew, deep down, that he wasn’t going to kill Hannibal. He wanted to hurt Hannibal as much as he was hurt, but it only resulted in Will getting more injured. He huffed out another broken laugh at the irony.

Hannibal kept cutting away at the soaked fabric of Will’s shirt, revealing the oozing bullet wound in his shoulder. Will stared at Hannibal’s fingers wiping away the excess blood, and endured the pain of his soft touch. He was suddenly struck by the incredible intimacy of the moment, of Hannibal cleaning his wounds and touching him gently. It was a painful juxtaposition; each one of Hannibal’s tender touches inevitably resulted in physical and emotional agony.

It hurt that the only times Hannibal only touched Will like that when he was hurting him.

“Did she kill her tenant, or did you?” Hannibal asked, his voice calling to Will through his muddled thoughts. What were they talking about again? 

Oh right. Chiyoh.

“She did,” Will choked out.

Hannibal smiled as he pulled more of Will’s shirt off. “Excellent.”

Will closed his eyes and let Hannibal’s approval wash over him as he continued to breathe heavily. Hannibal was glad that Chiyoh killed the man who supposedly killed Mischa, just as Will predicted he would be. He wondered if Hannibal would be just as proud of Will if he knew that he had manipulated her into committing the act.

As desperate as Will was to find out, he refused to ask.

Something cold was pressed into Will’s open, blood-soaked hand, and his fingers twitched at the sensation. He frowned and opened his eyes, but before he could shift his head to look, Hannibal spoke.

“You dropped your forgiveness, Will.”

Will curled his fingers around the knife, hating that it was in his hand but he lacked the strength to use it.

“You forgive how God forgives,” Hannibal continued. “Would you have done it quickly? Or would you have stopped to gloat?”

In that moment, Will wanted to stab Hannibal with the knife more than anything. He hadn’t wanted to kill him at all, let alone slowly or quickly. Anger rushed hot through Will’s body, making him feel overheated when combined with the burning pain. He opened his mouth to tell Hannibal he wanted to cut him like he’d cut Will —  _ deeply _ — but instead he asked:

“Does God gloat?” he mocked.

“Often,” Hannibal murmured.

He stared at Will before reaching for something on the table next to the couch. When Will’s eyes focused again, he realized it was a needle, and started to hyperventilate.

“No no no no no no,” Will pleaded, shaking his head with all the strength he had left. He didn’t want Hannibal to drug him again — it reminded him of his encephalitis days. He didn’t want to wake up not knowing what he had experienced at Hannibal’s mercy.

Hannibal ignored his begging and pierced Will’s shoulder with the needle, inserting the drug into his system easily. Will felt its effects almost instantaneously; his breathing slowed, his eyes got heavier, and his muscles numbed.

“Give that a moment,” he heard Hannibal say before Will’s eyes closed completely.

“Not - God,” Will slurred with the last of his strength. “I forgive - like you.”

As the last word passed from his numbing lips, Will’s mind went completely fuzzy and he slipped away into the dark sea of unconsciousness.

* * *

Hannibal caught the knife when Will’s hand went limp, and watched as Will’s breathing evened out. He liked observing Will when he suffered, it was fascinating how he would grow more beautiful as he felt more pain. Kneeling over Will right now, however, Hannibal appreciated how beautiful Will was when he was at peace. 

His brows were smoothed out, his mouth was lax, and his chest was rising and falling in an entrancing rhythm. It was a rare sight, one Hannibal wanted to see more often.

He set the knife down on the gaudy table next to the empty syringe and stood up. Will needed to have his wound cleaned and stitched up sooner rather than later, and for that Hannibal needed his surgical bag.

He was quick about retrieving it, not wanting to leave Will alone for more than a few seconds. He had injected Will with about 3 cc’s of Midazolam, enough to make him unconscious, but Will could wake up at any time. If he did, he would be very disoriented, and Hannibal would need to be there to help him through the fog.

There was a nagging thought in the back of Hannibal’s mind that insisted he didn’t need to take care of Will like this anymore if he planned on killing him soon, but Hannibal steadfastly ignored it. He would patch up Will to the best of his ability and only then, when he was clean and whole, would Hannibal kill and eat him.

The prospect was not as appealing as it had once been, but Hannibal didn’t see any other option. Will didn’t want anything to do with Hannibal, so the only way he could continue to have Will in his life was to eat him. That way, Will would always be with him.

Hannibal pulled himself out of his thoughts, unexpectedly saddened, and knelt back at Will’s side with the newly acquired surgical kit. He quickly used an alcohol wipe to clean the area, then reached for the forceps and expertly dug the bullet out of Will’s shoulder. Hannibal was glad that he drugged Will for this procedure, because if he had been awake he probably would have been screaming at the pain of how deep Hannibal had to dig to reach the bullet. As it was, Will was pleasantly unconscious, and a slight sheen of sweat on his face was the only indicator that his body was suffering.

Hannibal dropped the forceps and the large bullet onto the side table and picked up the needle and surgical thread. He briefly glanced at Will’s smooth face before wiping his wound clean again and getting to work stitching up the hole. It was hardly the most difficult bullet wound Hannibal ever had to suture, but he took his time. He wanted to make sure he didn’t make any careless mistakes, as he needed Will to be perfectly patched up for later.

Later, when Hannibal would eat him.

As he threaded the needle through Will’s skin, he wondered which part of Will he would eat first. Hannibal had given the notion quite a bit of thought, starting from the moment he first met Will in Jack’s office. There was something about Will that called to Hannibal, something that marked him as special, something that demanded Hannibal treat him differently than his other pets.

He used to imagine cracking Will open, bending back his ribs to remove his heart and making a beautiful centerpiece complete with Sweet Williams and rosy pomegranates out of Will’s chest. He used to imagine keeping Will in his basement for years, preserving his beauty and eating away at him little by little, so that Hannibal would never run out of his flesh.

Hannibal finished closing Will’s wound and reached a hand up to brush a sweaty curl off Will’s forehead. His fantasies of eating Will had evolved from those early days, and in fact, they had almost entirely disappeared until quite recently. After Will got out of prison, Hannibal realized his desire to consume Will could be fulfilled with a different type of consumption, one where they would consume each other’s minds instead of their bodies. For the first time in his life, Hannibal wanted someone to stand beside him as an equal, and share everything together in a mutual cycle of consumption and destruction.

When Will betrayed him, Hannibal had been denied his desires.

Now, unable to consume Will’s mind and uninterested in consuming his body like a common pig’s, Hannibal had one option left. He would eat his brain, the perfect crux of mind and body.

Hannibal brushed a thumb over Will’s forehead and sighed. He truly did not want to devour Will in this way, but it was the last option he had. Hannibal loved Will, and if this was the only way he could have him, forever, then so be it. Will’s brain was bewitching, and Hannibal would savor every bite.

He struggled to his feet, the injuries from Jack still quite fresh, and limped to Sogliato’s pristine bathroom. There was a tub that would fit Will nicely, and as Hannibal ran the bath he also laid out the spare clothes for Will that he had brought. It wouldn’t do to have Will all washed up for dinner only to be clad in wrinkled fabric.

When the bath was ready, Hannibal returned to the living area and gathered Will up in his arms. His breathing was even against Hannibal’s chest, and he did not wake as Hannibal commanded his own aching muscles to carry Will into the bathroom. He set Will down gingerly on the floor against the tub and started removing his clothes. 

Will’s shirt was in tatters, but from the rest of his suit Hannibal could tell that the ensemble was high quality. It was expensive and most likely came from a tailor shop, which made Hannibal frown because Will was not one to buy expensive — let alone brand new — clothes. He must have acquired the suit just for this occasion. 

He dressed up for Hannibal.

Hannibal closed his eyes and allowed himself a moment to hold the shredded remains of Will’s shirt.

Why would Will dress up for him, in a suit that he knew would appeal directly to Hannibal’s tastes? It must have been to hurt him even more, to tease him before Will attempted to kill him.

Suddenly, the moment where he first laid eyes on Will again in the Uffizi Gallery seemed more bitter than sweet.

“Clever, cruel boy,” Hannibal whispered.

He sighed and stripped away Will’s remaining clothing clinically, respectfully averting his eyes as he removed his lower garments. Once Will was fully naked, Hannibal stood and collected Will in his arms again, this time gently depositing him into the warm water of the tub. 

As soon as Will’s bloodied skin touched the water, his eyes fluttered and he groaned. Hannibal did not react and simply finished positioning Will in the bath so that his entire body, except his head, was submerged in the soapy water. It was not surprising that Will clawed his way back to consciousness, but Hannibal had hoped to have a bit more time with the most peaceful version of him.

“Don’t worry,” Hannibal murmured. “I’m cleaning the blood off you.”

Will’s eyes opened halfway and he lolled his head down to look at himself in the tub, the most movement he was allowed by the drugs coursing through his system.

“Issa bad ‘scuse,” Will slurred. “You jus’ want me naked.”

Hannibal chuckled softly and began to wipe his dirty face with a washcloth. “You are quite beautiful, Will.”

Will’s eyes slipped closed again and his lips quirked with the ghost of a smile. Hannibal ran a thumb over the corner of his mouth, then sighed and dragged the washcloth to his neck and collarbone. He did not really want to have a conversation with Will right now, given the low likelihood that he would remember it. Hannibal knew how much Will loathed losing time.

He was grateful that Will did not say much, and the silence stretched over them more comfortably than expected. Hannibal continued to wash Will’s body, and Will only let out a small moan when Hannibal ran the washcloth over the newly-stitched bullet wound. Hannibal allowed himself a tiny smile. He would’ve liked to hear Will’s moans of pleasure, but he would value the moans of pain if they were the only ones freely given. 

“I missssssed you,” Will mumbled.

Hannibal paused his washing, eyes filling with tears. “I missed you too, dear boy.”

Will hummed and leaned his head back against the edge of the tub. Hannibal took a deep breath, and blinked the tears out of his eyes. He was glad to know that Will missed him, even if it was just because he wanted to find and kill him.

He was also glad to have this moment, with Will docile and loopy. It wasn’t his present vulnerability that Hannibal valued, but rather the fact that he was completely bare for Hannibal to see. Will had always been unquantifiable, an intriguingly complicated puzzle that Hannibal wanted to solve. Over the few years they had known each other, Hannibal had worked tirelessly to reveal all those beautifully unique pieces that made up Will.

Seeing him now, exposed and open, Hannibal felt as if he solved a tiny piece of that puzzle. He treasured every second he had with Will, and he was grateful to share this soft, intimate moment with him.

It was another opportunity to know each other fully, to see each other clearly. Will saw him, and now Hannibal saw Will. He wished he had more opportunities to be this naked with Will — he wished for an entire lifetime of them — but Will didn’t want it.

_ I let you know me. See me. I gave you a rare gift, but you didn’t want it. _

_ Didn’t I? _

Hannibal took another breath and gently cleaned the blood from Will’s fingers. Those words from Will had haunted him for months, but now they just brought him pain. If Will truly wanted him, wanted what they had, then he wouldn’t have tried to kill Hannibal the first time they saw each other again.

Hannibal sighed and set the washcloth aside, now finished with cleaning his beloved, but Will frowned.

“Why’d ya stop?” he slurred.

“You’re clean now,” Hannibal replied. “It’s time to get out.”

“Hm… time for supper?”

Hannibal paused, his hand frozen mid-air where it was reaching for a towel. That was the first time he’d heard Will slip up and use the word “supper” instead of dinner before, and he relished in its use. Will had always been very careful to regulate his speech so as to not slip into his Southern accent and language, but in his disoriented state of mind it spilled over. Hannibal could hardly tell his accent through the slurring of his words, but he could clearly make out the actual words spoken.

Hearing Will be his authentic self, albeit in an intoxicated state, sent a pang through Hannibal’s heart. It was moments like these that he wished for more than anything, but Will’s word choice in his question infused pain into Hannibal’s answer.

“Yes,” he whispered. “It’s almost time.”

Time for Hannibal to use his bone saw to cut Will’s skull open and cook his brain. 

Time for dinner.

Hannibal hoisted Will out of the tub and onto the pile of his dirty clothes. Sogliato did not own a bathmat or anything of the sort, so Hannibal was reduced to reusing Will’s special suit to keep him comfortable. Hannibal wished he would’ve kept Sogliato alive just so he could have killed him in that moment.

Will groaned as Hannibal dried him off but didn’t say anything until Hannibal started dressing him in the clothes he had brought. He got the underwear and pants on first, to preserve Will’s dignity, and as he started buttoning up the white shirt, Will opened his eyes and frowned.

“New clothes?” he muttered. “Wait… Givin’ me a bath…”

Hannibal frowned as well, not knowing what thoughts were being strung together in Will’s fuzzy mind. He finished buttoning up the shirt and went to empty the tub.

“We finally runnin’ ‘way together?” Will gasped behind him, hopeful.

Hannibal gripped the porcelain edge of the tub and allowed a single tear to escape. It felt like his heart shattered with that one, innocent question.

It hurt because they  _ had _ a chance to run away together. Multiple chances, in fact. Hannibal had set up the apartment in Florence planning to take Will there. The master bedroom was complete with clothes for them both and Hannibal even bought that awful aftershave Will insisted on wearing. Hannibal also brought their forged papers along with Will’s clothes in his bag, still hoping that Will may want to take a chance on him.

But Will had rejected him eight months ago, and he had rejected him again today. No matter what nonsense he was spewing now, Will made his choice. Now Hannibal had to follow through with his own.

“No, Will,” he forced out, stiffly. “We’re going to dinner.”

He turned and was met with Will’s fallen expression.

“Oh. ‘Kay,” he mumbled, closing his eyes again.

Hannibal took a deep breath and pulled himself back together. Everything in him was fighting the plan to eat Will’s brain, but he had to stand firm in his conviction. He had to follow through with his plans, but… that didn’t mean anyone else had to.

Hannibal nodded once, leaned down to lift Will once again, and carried him into the dining area. He deposited Will into the chair at the head of the table with a huff of exertion, and reached for the nearby medical-grade straps to secure Will. Once Will was safely pinned to his chair, Hannibal brushed some curls off his forehead again.

“I will be right back,” he murmured.

Will gave him a lopsided smile. “Okie dokie.”

Hannibal smiled sadly at him and used his hand in Will’s hair to bring their faces closer. He tilted Will’s head up and kissed his forehead gently, savoring his taste and inhaling the scent of him. Hannibal would never overstep and kiss Will on the mouth without his consent, but he couldn’t resist pressing his lips to at least one spot on Will’s body.

Finally, Hannibal exhaled shakily and pulled back but Will surprised him by making a frustrated noise and tilting his head up. If Hannibal didn’t know better, he’d think Will was chasing his touch.

Hannibal pushed the ridiculous thought out of his mind and placed his hand on Will’s shoulder.

“I will return,” he repeated.

Will made another indecipherable noise but Hannibal shuffled back to the bathroom, removing his burner phone from his pocket as he went. The moment he shut the door he just stood in place, staring at the large tub for a long beat, before he sighed and dialed a number he hadn’t dialed in a long time. After a few rings the call connected with a crackle.

“Yes?” Chiyoh answered.

“Thank you for your protection,” Hannibal greeted. “I am pleased to see you.”

“You’re welcome,” Chiyoh responded dryly. “I thought you would be.”

Hannibal smiled slightly. “If I may ask one more favor?”

“You may.”

“Do not interfere,” Hannibal requested. “By all means continue to watch over me, but no matter what you see, do not interfere.”

Chiyoh was silent for a second. “Not even to save your life?”

“Even then.”

He could hear Chiyoh swallow over the phone. “If you wish.”

“I do. Thank you, Chiyoh. It would also be best if you lost your phone,” Hannibal said, then hung up.

He wasn’t completely sure what was going to happen during his dinner with Will, but he knew the noose around his throat was closing. Jack was here, the  _ polizia _ were now informed, and Verger’s men were most certainly closing in. He was going through with his plans, but he was also polite enough to let others go through with theirs.

Hannibal cleaned himself up and changed into the only clean clothes he had left, as the ones he was wearing were soaked with water, sweat, and Will’s blood. He felt a bit better when he looked in the mirror to see himself, still battered and bruised, but refreshed and presentable for dinner.

He exited the bathroom and glanced at Will. The younger man was right where Hannibal left him, restrained to the chair, but now his eyes were closed and his breathing was more even. It seemed as if the drug had taken him once again.

Hannibal strode past Will and into Sogliato’s terrible excuse for a kitchen, quickly whipping up a little something that would improve Will’s taste. Hannibal was positive that Will would taste naturally delectable, but he had eaten brain before and it wasn’t his favorite cut of meat. Hannibal thought he would slice Will’s brain and fry each piece in front of him, so that Will could witness their intimate joining. He wondered which slice it would be before Will finally lost enough blood and his brain ceased to function.

Hannibal did not want to think about that, because the loss of Will’s brain — the loss of  _ Will _ — was without doubt a terrible tragedy. If only it wasn’t unavoidable.

Hannibal finished the herb infusion and sighed. He would slice off the frontal lobe first, so as to preserve Will’s vital bodily functions. He would work slowly, and hopefully the police would not be too incompetent to find him before Will was lost forever.

His plan now clarified, Hannibal let the infusion sit on the stove as he got busy positioning three place settings on the dining table. One for Will, at the head of the table. One for Hannibal, at his right hand. One for Jack, at the end of the table, if he was smart enough to figure out where Hannibal was in time for dinner.

Hannibal walked back to the kitchen, transferring the infusion into an ornate ceramic pot and carrying it to the dining table. As he approached Will and placed the pot down, he noticed that Will’s eyes were now open and appeared to be a bit more lucid than before. Hannibal tightened his restraints to be sure he wouldn’t escape, and joined Will at the table.

He took a moment to simply look at Will. If Hannibal had his way, then this was the last time he would be able to do so. He found that words were perched on the tip of his tongue, wanting to make themselves known in the face of the end.

“I don’t indulge much in regret,” Hannibal started softly, “but I am sorry to be leaving Italy.”

He sighed and scooped up the first spoonful of herb infusion. “There were things in the  _ Palazzo Capponi _ I would have liked to read.”

Hannibal brought the spoon to his mouth, blowing slightly on the hot liquid to cool it, then held it out to Will. “I would have liked to play the clavier, or perhaps compose.”

Will tried to turn away, but his muscles were still sluggish and Hannibal gently gripped his jaw and fed him the first spoonful of the infusion. Hannibal lowered the spoon and examined Will’s face, still overwhelmingly beautiful even with the bruises — or perhaps more so because of them.

“I would have liked to show you Florence, Will,” Hannibal confessed in a whisper.

Hannibal could imagine it clearly, since he had been imagining it for months. He and Will, strolling down the old, magnificent streets of Florence hand-in-hand, simply being together. Florence was home to so many things Hannibal loved, and he would have liked to add one more thing to that collection. He would have liked to show Will the things that inspired him in his youth, the places he loved to draw, the art he admired most.

He wanted to share with Will and show him everything, but Will didn’t want it.

“The soup isn’t very good,” Will mumbled.

Hannibal was unable to keep his lips from curving upwards into a smile. He loved Will’s wit just as much as he loved every other part of him, and he was happy he was able to experience it one last time.

“It’s a parsley and thyme infusion,” Hannibal responded. “More for my sake than yours. Have another sip.”

He fed Will another spoonful. “Let that circulate.”

In true form, Will surprised him by not fighting the second mouthful. He took it easily; not a drop spilled.

“Are we expecting company?” Will slurred, eyeing the extra place setting.

Hannibal hummed, scooping another spoonful. “An invitation was given. We will see if it is accepted.”

Will leaned his head back against the chair, probably an attempt to cope with the disorientation. “Jack?”

“Indeed,” Hannibal murmured. He fed Will another sip of the infusion then turned his face towards the door as he caught a familiar scent.

“It appears my invitation was accepted,” he told Will. “You’ve had a fair amount of the infusion, and now it is time to prepare for our guest.”

Will mumbled incoherently and Hannibal stood to return the pot to the kitchen. He traded it out for a pan and the portable stove he managed to find in the back of one of Sogliato’s cabinets, and returned to the dining room to set up. He also retrieved Will’s knife from the table, and cleaned up his surgical supplies. Satisfied that everything was ready, Hannibal fetched some butter and started melting it in the pan.

“Whassa smell?” Will slurred.

“It’s butter, Will. Intended to provide a subtle base for frying food.”

“Oh,” Will mumbled. “Finally gon’ eat me?”

Hannibal set the butter down and sighed, ignoring the ache in his heart. “I fear so, dear Will.”

Will closed his eyes and turned his head away, leaving Hannibal with the distinct impression that he was being ignored. He smiled fondly and dropped to his knees, shimmying under the table to wait for Jack to arrive.

The wait wasn’t long. He heard the door open with a soft click and Jack’s smell wafted into the apartment, tarnishing the scent of the butter. Hannibal remained under the table as Jack’s footsteps grew steadily closer, until eventually they came to a stop right next to Will’s chair.

“Will,” Jack whispered urgently.

There was a slight pause, then Hannibal heard Will respond just as quietly. 

“He’s under the table, Jack.”

With Will’s perfect announcement, Hannibal grabbed onto Jack’s ankle and slashed his Achilles heel in one precise motion. Jack fell back with a shout and, unable to walk and distracted by the pain, didn’t have time to react before Hannibal slithered out from under the table, kicked the gun away, and wrapped his hands tight around his throat. 

After Jack faded away to unconsciousness, Hannibal dragged him to the chair opposite Will and set up an IV. He was only administering a short-term paralytic, and the drug would need to be given continuously to be effective. Hannibal completed his task in a matter of minutes, and gave Jack a little slap to rouse him before heading back to add some herbs to the browning butter.

“I’ve taken the liberty of giving you something to help you relax,” Hannibal explained as Jack blinked back to consciousness. “Won’t be able to do much more than chew, but that’s all you need to do.”

Jack really was quite easy to neutralize. Part of Hannibal wished that he put up more of a fight, but he supposed he’d have to rely on Verger’s men to stop him now. Part of him, albeit a small part, was salivating at the promise of eating Will.

“I didn’t have an opportunity to ask you during our last encounter, but did you enjoy the exhibition?” Hannibal asked lightly. “A different kind of evil minds museum.”

“Not that different,” Jack murmured.

Hannibal tilted his head, conceding the point.

“We were supposed to sit down together at your house in Baltimore,” Jack said. “Just the three of us.”

“You were to be the guest of honor,” Hannibal quipped.

“But the menu was all wrong,” Will uttered. 

Hannibal smiled at him, glad to see that his sense was returning. “Yes, it was.”

He retrieved the box containing his surgical bone saw and turned back to Will. “Jack was the first to suggest getting inside your head. Now we both have the opportunity to chew, quite literally, what we’ve only chewed figuratively.”

Hannibal took his time assembling the bone saw, and only when he finished did he allow himself to look at Will.

Hannibal could only hope that his face did not reflect the wave of emotions that he willingly unleashed as he gazed at the man he loved. Will always had the power to make Hannibal experience feelings — experience  _ life _ — more profoundly, and this was no exception. 

Hannibal’s entire body ached with sentiments he rarely faced: sorrow, yearning, and regret. Hannibal rarely felt regret, but in this moment he wished he could have done things differently, if it meant earning him just a shred more time spent with Will.

“Hannibal…” Jack warned.

Hannibal ignored him and turned on the saw. This moment was for Jack to witness, not to experience. This moment was an intimate one, for him and Will only. If undisturbed, this would be their last moment together.

Hannibal closed his eyes, breathed, and opened them to meet Will’s beautiful ocean-blue eyes. They were still clouded with the drug, and although Hannibal would have liked Will to be completely cogent for this, he could settle for this version since it meant that Will would feel minimal pain.

With no further reason for hesitation, Hannibal lifted the buzzing saw and touched it to the right side of Will’s forehead.

Immediately, Will’s skin opened up and blood started pouring and spraying. Hannibal did not press too deeply or move too quickly; a last effort to delay Will’s death. He was cutting Will open with the intention of killing him, unlike the last time he sliced into Will, but Hannibal still clung to any excuse that would delay what he knew he had to do.

Hannibal didn’t  _ want _ to do this, but one doesn't always get what one wants. 

He was vaguely aware of Jack screaming, but his focus was entirely on Will in the chair, jerking under Hannibal’s hands. Blood was dripping into Will’s eyes and onto his shirt, painting a beautiful picture in a swath of red. The high-pitched buzzing of the saw did nothing to mask Will’s little gasps of pain, and Hannibal relished each one like an offering.

Suddenly, when the bone saw was about halfway across Will’s forehead, the door banged open and men with guns swarmed in. Hannibal immediately removed the saw and powered it down, taking a deep breath. For the first time in his life, he was happy to leave his artwork unfinished.

“ _ Sono un ufficiale del FBI _ ,” Jack asserted loudly. “ _ Ascoltami. Mi chiamo Jack Crawford. _ ”

Hannibal leveled his gaze at the man who seemed to be in charge and calmly placed the bloodied saw on the table. 

“ _ Sono un ufficiale del FBI! _ ” Jack insisted. “ _ Ascoltami! Ascoltami! _ ”

Hannibal put his hands up without prompting and slowly dropped to his knees.

“ _ Ascoltami… Commendatore _ Benetti,” Jack said with recognition. “Don’t imagine you're here to make an arrest.”

“No,” Benetti chuckled. “You imagine correctly.”

Hannibal laced his hands behind his head. It seemed Mason Verger had bought his way into the  _ Questura di Firenze, _ in spite of Hannibal’s slaying of Rinaldo Pazzi.

With a nod from Benetti, the man behind Hannibal stepped forward and bludgeoned him, hard, on the back of the head. Hannibal was gone before he hit the floor.

His last thought before blacking out was that he hoped Will would join him on his travels to Muskrat Farm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts??
> 
> I'm almost certainly going to split Digestivo in half too, and those chapters will take me a while because there's just so much missing scenes I need to write haha! Follow me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/Hannibalsfangs) for exclusive sneak peeks :)


	8. Digestivo Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The long awaited transport scene is here!! Ever wondered what happened in that long plane ride from Italy to the Verger Farm?? Wonder no longer :) 
> 
> This chapter also includes Will going feral and Hannibal having heart eyes <3
> 
> There are a lot of feelings and introspection in this monster of an episode so of course I had to split it again! But this first half is like 7k words hahaha so enjoy!

Will woke up with his head killing him. He groaned, becoming aware of other aches in his body as he blinked open his eyes and tried to figure out where he was.

He had a headache, probably from dehydration and the drugs Hannibal gave him, but his head was also throbbing with sharp pain. He was confused for a second about the source of that particular ache, but then his mind rebooted and he vaguely remembered Hannibal sawing into his head and Jack screaming.

Hannibal had really tried to kill him this time, and he would’ve if Mason Verger’s men hadn’t interrupted him.

Will didn’t remember anything else, and he hated it.

His body was in agony from all it had been through in the last few days, and Will tried to readjust to find a more comfortable position. It was only then that he realized he was lying on a cold, metal surface that was softly vibrating. He couldn’t move his arms out from where they were uncomfortably squished under his back, and the feeling of something thin digging into his wrists suggested that his hands had been bound with a zip tie. Will grunted and looked around blearily, seeing a variety of crates and boxes crammed into a long, but thin, metal space.

It was the cargo hold of an airplane.

“Just like pigs,” Will muttered, squirming around to prop himself up in a sitting position.

“Quite right,” a prim voice said behind Will.

Will groaned in annoyance and scooted himself around so that he was propped against a crate right across from Hannibal. Because of the poor lighting, he could just make out the bruised side of Hannibal’s face and the positioning of his body, sat up against the metal wall of the cargo hold with his hands restrained behind him, just like Will. 

He noticed that Hannibal was wearing something different than what he was at the Uffizi gallery. Will glanced down to his own clothes and held back another groan. His nice suit from Prague was gone, probably lost forever, and in its place were black slacks and a white dress shirt streaked with blood.

He didn’t remember changing, and rationally knew that there was no way he changed his own clothes in his intoxicated state. Still, Will refused to consider the only alternative.

“How long have we been here?” Will huffed out. 

He really did not want to talk to Hannibal about anything right now, but he did want to know how much longer he was going to be stuck in a dark, cold cargo hold of a plane with him. Will didn’t know if he could handle an extended amount of time with the man who just tried to saw open his skull.

“I regained consciousness right as they were loading us in, and that was about two hours ago,” Hannibal answered. “Since it is about a 10-hour flight to Baltimore, I estimate that we have eight hours left.”

Will sighed and tilted his head back against the hard wooden crate. That’s just great. Eight hours stuck in a plane with Hannibal Lecter.

“Do you think they’ll fly us into Baltimore?” Will wondered. “Knowing Mason, he’ll probably fly us straight to a private airfield right outside the estate.”

Hannibal hummed. “Even so, the flight time would virtually be the same.”

Will chewed his lip. “I assume you’ve already tried to get out of these restraints. Verdict?”

“Mason’s men know what they’re doing. They are too tight to get out of alone, and even if we tried to help each other, I fear that we can’t break the plastic without a tool.”

“Your sharp teeth won’t work?” Will asked sardonically.

Hannibal smiled. “If we were bound with rope, they would. I’m afraid my teeth meet their limit at hard plastic.”

“Ugh. Okay.” Will closed his eyes, intending to do his best to ignore Hannibal for eight hours. God knew he needed some actual sleep, and Will usually slept through flights anyway.

Of course, Hannibal fucking Lecter wouldn’t make things so easy.

“Could you give me a verbal report of your injuries?” Hannibal inquired clinically.

“Could you shut up?” Will sniped back, opening his eyes to glare at Hannibal.

Hannibal just looked amused, which caused the anger that had been simmering inside Will to boil over. 

“In the past 48 hours, I have been pushed off a train, shot, drugged, and had my skull sawed open. By  _ you _ ,” Will snarled. “You just tried to kill me, so stop pretending you care. Drop the kind doctor act, and shut the fuck up.”

Hannibal blinked slowly.

“Those two things are not mutually exclusive,” he finally replied.

He did not elaborate, but Will knew exactly what he meant. It was possible to care about someone and want to kill them at the same time.

Hannibal’s eyes burned into him, daring Will to disagree. But Will would not take the bait, because he did not disagree. He knew, more than most, what it was like to feel those conflicting emotions.

Still, that did not mean Will was not pissed at Hannibal. He was incredibly angry, and that anger stemmed from being deeply wounded. Will had never seriously tried to kill Hannibal, although he thought about it over and over again. Likewise, Hannibal had never actually tried to kill Will. Until a few hours ago.

The blinding hurt and anger Will felt now was comparable to how he felt when he woke up in the hospital eight months ago, gutted and abandoned.

He really didn’t want to continue talking to Hannibal, but even his pride could not contain the desperate words that burst out of his chest. “Why the fuck did you try to kill me  _ now?  _ Why didn’t you just kill me that night in your kitchen?”

Hannibal sighed. “I was heartbroken that night, Will, but I did not want you dead. I wanted you to suffer, as I had suffered.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” Will growled. “Why now?”

Why? Why, after their intimate moment in the Uffizi Gallery together? Why, after Will just tried to even the scales between them? Why, when Will said he forgave Hannibal?

Will was angry, he was hurt, and he was afraid. He was afraid that Hannibal tried to kill him because he realized that, after all these months apart, he didn’t want to be connected to Will anymore.

“I was considering it as a possibility for some time, but I truly settled on that course of action after you tried to kill me first,” Hannibal said stiffly. “It really shouldn’t be that surprising, Will.”

Suddenly, Will’s depressing thoughts screeched to a halt. “Wait, what?”

  
“You made it incredibly clear that you wanted nothing to do with me after you tried to stab me in broad daylight, so I decided the only way to keep you with me was to eat you,” Hannibal continued. “I had hoped you would choose to stay with me after you squandered the first chance, but I see now that I was foolish to wish for something so far-fetched.”

“Hold on,” Will spat out. “ _ What? _ ”

Hannibal looked at him sharply. “What is so difficult to understand?”

“Your fucking thought process!” Will snapped. “It sounds very rational,  _ Dr. Lecter _ , but you got the premise wrong. I never tried to kill you.”

Hannibal frowned. “I distinctly remember you — ”

“Yes, I tried to stab you, but it wasn’t to kill you,” Will snarled, getting pissed again. “I just wanted to  _ forgive _ you like you forgave me — with a deep scar. Couldn’t figure that one out?”

_ Dumbass _ , Will thought as he caught his breath and leaned back against the crate. He had been hunched forward as he hissed at Hannibal, the movement straining his muscles painfully, and he let out a pained exhale as he readjusted to get more comfortable.

Hannibal looked a little shocked but, true to form, recovered quickly. “Well then, you should have been clear about your intentions.”

Will scoffed. “The entire point of stabbing you was to catch you off guard. Telling you what I was going to do would have defeated the entire purpose.”

Will wanted to scar Hannibal, but only in the right way. If Hannibal knew, and let Will do that to him, then it wouldn’t have meant anything. Will wanted to surprise him, to  _ earn _ the right to scar the pristine Hannibal Lecter.

“You catch me off guard all the time,” Hannibal said quietly.

Will furrowed his brow and purposefully remained silent. Hannibal had lost his fire the moment Will explained his design, and even apologized in his own roundabout way. Will had no idea what to make of an apologetic Hannibal, let alone an emotionally honest one. Will didn’t know if he could trust him, after everything, but he didn’t think Hannibal was lying. 

It was the high likelihood of Hannibal being honest right now that made Will feel distinctly uncomfortable.

He kept quiet for a while, letting the tension between them decrease with the silence. Will could admit that ignoring Hannibal was also a way for him to scrape back some power. The power in their relationship was constantly fought over with the rhythmic push and pull of a violent tug-of-war, and this is Will’s way of taking it back from Hannibal after he stole it with the bone saw.

Will sighed and turned his head to the side, the cool wood feeling refreshing against his throbbing forehead. He thought he had his feelings about Hannibal organized and processed, but seeing him again and the shitshow that followed destroyed that belief. He had nothing handled, and he wasn’t sure if he ever would. Hannibal inspired so much in Will that it all got mixed together, making it extremely difficult for Will to figure out who he was, what he wanted, and what he was going to do.

It was all starting to get so tiring.

Will pressed his forehead harder into the wooden crate, then paused. His cut wasn’t opening up under the pressure, and it didn’t feel like it hit the bone. He glanced at Hannibal and frowned. 

“...My cut isn’t that deep.”

Hannibal’s gaze flickered to his forehead and remained there a beat too long before dropping down to make eye contact.

“Ideally in a craniotomy, the patient’s outer layer of skin would be peeled back first, thus allowing for better penetration when cutting into the skull — ”

“OKAY! Fuck, I got it. Shouldn't have asked,” Will muttered.

He should’ve known that Hannibal was just trying to do the operation correctly. He hated himself for the sliver of hope he felt along with the semi-shallow cut on his skin. It would most certainly scar, but his skull itself was not touched. For a second, Will hoped that was because Hannibal had second thoughts about killing him, but with his answer he made it abundantly clear that was not the case.

His mind flashed with images of Hannibal cutting him open and he pushed them away forcefully, anger starting to grow again with the hurt he was feeling. The images changed, settling on when Will was sprawled out on the couch and Hannibal was helping him out of his jacket in order to suture his bullet wound. Will remembered Hannibal guiding him into a gentle embrace, his hand brushing the back of his hair. The incredible pain from being touched so gently only for it to inevitably be paired with violence —  _ again _ — made Will see red.

“I should’ve known you would only touch me so gently when you were planning on cutting me open,” Will growled to himself.

He was only aware that he said that out loud when he heard Hannibal’s barely audible inhale.

“I wasn’t aware that you wanted me to be gentle with you,” Hannibal breathed.

Will started, embarrassed that he slipped up and said something so vulnerable out loud, and stubbornly ignored Hannibal to glare at a box. He hated that Hannibal made him feel so angry and hurt that he couldn’t control his actions, he hated that Hannibal wasn’t scarred, he hated that his deepest bond with another human being was with a cannibalistic serial killer.

Most of all, Will hated the fact that he didn’t really hate Hannibal at all.

“Will,” Hannibal called softly.

Will met his eyes automatically and found them full of something that, in anyone other than Hannibal Lecter, Will would label as tender regret. All the rage rushed out of Will at once, leaving him with a dull, raw ache.

“I have performed many craniotomies in my time as a surgeon,” he murmured quietly, “but never before have I intentionally slowed the procedure in the hope that it would be interrupted, or treated the patient so gently.”

“Shut up,” Will whispered, forcefully breaking their eye contact by looking away. Hannibal fell silent but his words still echoed in the cold, dark space between them, invading Will’s heart like a thousand knives.

He desperately needed something else to focus on, and his mind clutched at the most obvious thing.

“You should’ve killed Mason when you had the chance,” he blurted out. “Now we’re going to die after being tortured by that sadist.” No _ gentleness _ there.

Hannibal hummed. “I am quite content with how Mason Verger made himself useful in recent events, thus I cannot say I regret leaving him alive.”

Will scoffed and continued to ignore Hannibal’s stare.

“Perhaps  _ you _ should have killed him when you had the chance, if you feel so strongly about it,” Hannibal said lightly.

“Perhaps I should’ve,” Will sneered.

He could practically  _ feel  _ Hannibal’s pleased smile and groaned, suddenly physically and emotionally exhausted. With nothing to distract from it, the pain in Will’s entire body was almost unbearable. His injuries from getting thrown off the train, being shot, and getting his head sawed into all culminated into making his body one big, open wound. He also realized that he was shivering, likely as a result of blood loss.

Will considered his options as best he could with the lack of blood running through his brain, and sighed heavily. He needed to sleep, he needed to stay warm, and he needed to distract himself from the awful pain. Right now, there was only one way to do that.

He fought with himself until a violent shiver wracked his exhausted body, and he gave in. Carefully pushing off against the crate, Will maneuvered himself to his side and inched forward until his head bumped into Hannibal’s knee. 

“Don’t fucking say anything,” Will warned.

Hannibal obeyed but didn't hide his sudden intake of breath.

Will squirmed around until he was moderately comfortable, head in Hannibal’s lap. His touch made the pain drift away just enough so that Will felt the promise of sleep wash over him and he closed his eyes, grateful to get some actual rest before the next time someone tried to kill him.

* * *

Hannibal held his breath as Will drifted off to sleep, injured head resting in the nook of his crossed legs. 

He could scarcely believe it was happening. He had just tried to kill and eat Will, a fact that Will was all too aware of, but here he was, sleeping in Hannibal’s lap. Vulnerable. Trusting.

It was a gift, and much more than Hannibal deserved.

He had never felt as shocked as he did when Will informed him that he did not intend to kill him outside the Uffizi. Will had shared his violent fantasies about killing Hannibal before, so naturally Hannibal assumed that he had finally given into those urges. He had never thought that Will simply wanted to scar him — but then again, perhaps Will felt the same when Hannibal scarred him?

When Will asked about that night in Baltimore, he sounded confused as to why Hannibal hadn’t just killed him then. Hannibal had thought about it, of course, but a life without Will wasn’t truly what he wanted. He just wanted to hurt Will, like Will had hurt him.

It seemed as if Will had similar feelings.

When Hannibal thought about it that way, it made perfect sense. They were just alike, after all. Two sides of the same coin. The reason Hannibal never expected Will to match his behavior was simply because he thought he pushed Will too far. Slitting Abigail’s throat in front of him was quite cruel, and the last time Hannibal killed someone close to Will, he had lashed out and tried to kill Hannibal.

Hannibal very much expected that Will’s reaction this time would be the same; a belief solidified when Will pulled the knife on him. But Hannibal realized now, quite fondly, that he never should have thought he could predict Will.

Will never failed to surprise him. Hannibal looked forward to the day when Will got his wish and bested Hannibal in a fight, carving his blade deep into Hannibal’s skin. He imagined a fight between them would be raw and bloody, potentially the most intimate thing either of them had experienced. The prospect of them both being physically marked by each other excited Hannibal.

He genuinely hoped Will got his wish. As a natural optimist, Hannibal was quite confident that they would squeeze their way out of the current situation. Perhaps he could manipulate Margot into releasing them.

Whatever the future held, Hannibal was content to let it play out. He was too preoccupied with the present moment, with Will sleeping soundly against him.

As he stared down at Will’s battered and bloody but peaceful face, Hannibal felt a rare twinge of remorse. He didn’t truly want to kill and eat Will in the first place, but now, after knowing of his intentions, Hannibal found himself incredibly grateful that he had been stopped.

Suddenly, Hannibal noticed that Will’s peaceful slumber was interrupted by a series of shivers. He grumbled in his sleep, automatically trying to get closer to Hannibal, and Hannibal realized that Will must be quite cold from the amount of blood loss he had suffered. He wished he could take WIll in his arms and run his fingers through his unruly curls, but alas his hands were bound. He doubted that Will would allow him to either, even if they were not.

As it was, Hannibal carefully rearranged himself to best provide Will with the maximum amount of body heat. He gently uncrossed his legs to push Will’s head out of his lap and slithered down to press against him, tangling their legs together. He nudged Will’s head against his chest and noticed that, with the increased amount of body heat between them, his face had once again evened out and his shivers had abated.

Hannibal nodded, pleased. By his estimate they had about seven hours of flight time left; an acceptable amount of sleep to refresh Will’s body. Hannibal himself only needed a few hours of sleep every night, and he decided to be productive by closing his eyes to get some right now. He was still wounded from his fight with Jack, and he wanted to regain his strength. 

He would need it once Verger’s men opened the cargo hold to transport them to Muskrat farm.

Hannibal succeeded in resting for a few hours, and was pleased to see Will still fast asleep beside him when he opened his eyes. Hannibal’s gaze softened as he stared at Will’s peaceful face, and he wished he could wake up to the sight more often. Every day, if he had his choice.

He wanted Will spread out on his bed, brown hair splayed across cobalt blue sheets that matched his eyes. He wanted to actually have use of his hands, and brush the stray curls away from Will’s forehead or lay an arm around his waist. He wanted to wake up after a late night, and bring Will breakfast in bed.

Hannibal continued to stare at Will and imagine the future he’ll likely never have until he felt the plane begin its descent. He immediately began to extricate himself from where he was tangled together with Will, slowly so as not to wake him, and inched his way toward the opening of the cargo hold. He positioned himself near the side, just behind the unfolding door, so that he had the element of surprise whenever it opened.

He managed to get to his feet and brace himself right as the plane touched down, the landing feeling much too bumpy and uneven for an official airport runway. Will had been correct, then. They were to be kept out of official flight records and brought to Mason Verger as soon as possible.

A few moments after the plane came to a complete stop, Hannibal heard voices outside the cargo hold. He lowered himself into a crouch, and watched with sharp eyes as the door began to drop open.

The moment the cargo hold door fully descended upon the snowy runway and about a dozen armed men came into view, Hannibal leapt from his hiding place with a snarl. He tore the throat out of the closest man easily, swallowing his surprised cry. Blood coating his mouth, he whirled to the side and attacked again, slamming his skull against another man’s. He bared his teeth and side-stepped a third man who tried to punch him, determined to send each man down with his hands tied behind his back.

Will was sleeping in the plane behind him, and Hannibal wouldn’t let anyone touch him.

He was too preoccupied with defeating the men in front of him that he didn’t notice what was going on behind him until a gruff voice yelled, “Stop, or I’ll shoot!”

Hannibal quickly turned to politely inform the soon-dead man that he would  _ not _ shoot, as Mason Verger very much wanted him alive, and froze.

Will was blinking back at him, a thick hand wrapped around his neck and a gun held flush against his temple.

“They told us to bring you alive, but this one is expendable,” the man holding Will grunted. “Stop, or I’ll kill him.”

Hannibal met Will’s eyes and nodded, once.

Immediately, he was tackled onto the cold, snowy ground and rope was wrapped around his ankles. Then he was hauled up and carried to a nearby truck, the Verger emblem emblazoned on the side. The back of the truck was open to reveal racks of pigs hanging upside down, and Hannibal smiled. He turned to lock eyes with Will, wanting to share his amusement. The pigs’ experience, indeed.

It took three men each to haul Hannibal and Will up by their ankles and hang them next to the pigs. The man who held a gun to Will’s head looked them over once and lingered on Hannibal’s face.

“Clean him up,” he growled. “Don’t want Verger to know he took a few of our guys down.”

Hannibal smiled as the blood was wiped from his face and neck, exposing his reddened teeth. Those were wiped clean too, although more hesitantly than the rest of him. Soon after, the truck was closed up and they were headed to Muskrat Farm.

The drive was not a particularly long one, but Hannibal was very mindful of Will’s condition. He could only see Will out of the corner of his eye, and he did not look like he was handling all the blood rushing to his head well. Hannibal didn’t expect him to, with how dehydrated he must be.

“Stay with me, Will,” Hannibal grunted.

“Shut up,” came Will’s weak reply.

They swayed back and forth by their feet for a few more minutes before thankfully coming to a stop. The truck door was opened with a rough clang, and Hannibal was not at all surprised to see Mason Verger’s unfortunate face sneering down at him.

“Gentlemen! Welcome to Muskrat Farm.”

Hannibal was pleased to see that the skin grafts Mason had received did nothing to reconstruct his lips, forcing his words to come out like the croaking of some old, gnarled beast.

“Your people might have assassinated me in Florence, Mason,” Hannibal suggested.

“Where’s the fun in that?” Mason taunted. “I still keep my father’s knife, ever ready to slip into a pig’s back to check the depth of the fat.”

He brandished his father’s old knife, twirling it as well as he could with the nerve damage from the spinal injury Hannibal gave him. “Cordell, if you would.”

The big, bald man at Mason’s right hand, Cordell, stepped into the truck and dutifully spun Hannibal around. Hannibal’s facial expression did not change as he felt Mason slowly insert the knife into his back, then remove it.

“A little lean, I think,” Mason remarked. “Maybe we should fatten you up, shall we?”

The next moment, Hannibal was being removed from the rack and set on his feet again. He maintained eye contact with Mason as Will received the same treatment beside him, before being pushed forward and trapped into a stand-up wheelchair.

“Bandage him up,” Mason ordered, nodding at Will. “Can’t have him bleeding all over my pristine workstation.”

Cordell obeyed and quickly bandaged Will’s head, his cut having reopened from being hung upside down. Hannibal glanced at Will and expertly masked the concern he felt from seeing him so disoriented. As a doctor, he knew that Will would regain his sense after a few minutes as his blood evenly redistributed to his body and he had some water, but he was still a bit worried. He didn’t trust Mason to treat either of them very well.

Mason wheeled himself away into the nearest building, and Hannibal and Will were pushed after him in the stand-up wheelchairs. They passed by a few pig pens before ending up in a room where a few individual pens were clustered in a circle around the room, and there were other pigs in containers hooked up to various IVs and machines along the walls. To Hannibal, the place looked like Mason’s playroom.

“It’s more trouble to move a semi-wild pig against its will than it is to kidnap a man,” Mason declared. 

“Pigs are harder to get hold of, and big ones are stronger than a man,” Cordell agreed heartily.

Mason’s eyes sparkled, and Hannibal imagined he might smile if he had lips. “There are the tusks to consider, if you want to maintain the integrity of your abdomen.”

The entire procession came to a stop in the middle of the pig pen circle, and Hannibal and Will were shackled by their wheelchairs to the wooden pens directly behind them.

“Something worth maintaining, Mr. Graham,” Mason addressed Will severely. “Tusked beasts instinctively disembowel.”

To Hannibal’s concern and amusement, Will looked entirely too groggy to understand whatever convoluted pig metaphor Mason was spewing.

“At swine fairs, I’ve seen exotic pigs from all over the world,” Mason continued, whirring around to face Hannibal. “ _ You _ are the best of all that I’ve seen.”

Hannibal smiled.

“We are going to have some good, funny times, Dr. Lecter,” Mason assured darkly.

“I look forward to it,” Hannibal replied politely.

Mason scoffed and whirred back down the hallway they came from. “You’ll both be joining me for dinner later, so make yourselves presentable. We’ll start our good times then.”

“Have them ready by 8 p.m. sharp,” Cordell instructed the four guards that were left to watch over Hannibal and Will.

Once Mason and his entourage left, Hannibal took some time to fully catalogue his surroundings. The walls were red brick, and the floors were covered with a thin layer of hay. The smell was potent, but nothing Hannibal couldn’t handle. Instead of a filthy pigsty, this room, as Hannibal noted earlier, appeared to be Mason’s special room where he conducted various pig-related experiments.

Hannibal was interested in knowing the fine mechanics of Mason’s ghoulish activities, and he wondered if any of his novice experiments were successful. Knowing the incompetence of Mason Verger, Hannibal suspected not.

He returned his gaze to Will and was not pleased to see that he was still looking incredibly disoriented.

“Excuse me,” Hannibal addressed the guards politely. “May I request some water? I’m quite parched.”

Three of the men ignored him, but the closest one to Hannibal narrowed his eyes. “You aren’t allowed anything the boss doesn’t approve.”

“Ah, I understand. I’m to be the prize pig,” Hannibal nodded. “In that case, may I at least insist on some water for my companion here? I was informed that your boss doesn’t much care about him.”

The guard hesitated for a moment before turning and walking out.

Hannibal allowed himself a small smile. He had missed playing with people, and it brought him immense satisfaction to do so now, at Will’s benefit.

The man returned fairly quickly with a plastic water bottle and, with an annoyed glare in Hannibal’s direction, held it up to Will’s lips. Hannibal watched with secret relief as Will gulped the water down, draining the entire bottle in just under a minute. Once done, Will licked his lips and his eyes started to clear. He looked around as if just now noticing their surroundings, before his gaze stopped on Hannibal.

They stared at each other for an indiscernible amount of time, nothing in particular passing between them but just being content with their eye contact. Hannibal had nothing more beautiful to look at, anyway.

They did not speak, and although Hannibal wasn’t entirely sure of the reason, he suspected it was because they were not alone. Will was always rather private, and although this quality was usually endearing, Hannibal worried about its current persistence. Although he was hopeful he could get them out of this situation, there was still a possibility that they would both die here. He did not know when they would be separated either, and this may be the last time they would be able to speak to each other without Mason Verger present.

Still, Will refused to talk.

Eventually, a couple of the guards left briefly and returned with clear garment bags containing exquisite suits. Hannibal’s eyes gleamed at the sight, pleased that Mason decided to dress them up for dinner. Two guards each approached Hannibal and Will, one training a gun to their respective heads and the other in charge of changing them into the new clothes. The process of being stipped naked and redressed did not bother Hannibal, and when he glanced at Will after they were both newly clothed he was similarly detached.

Hannibal was sorry to see Will’s bloodied white shirt go, but he was also enjoying the sight of him clad in a well-tailored suit. The design did not suit Will as well as the one he wore in the Uffizi Gallery, but it was still beautiful on him. Will’s bandaged head and bruised face only added to his unparalleled beauty, and Hannibal gazed at him until the men wheeled them away.

Hannibal and Will were steered out of the pig warehouse and into the living quarters of the Verger estate. Hannibal looked around with interest as they were wheeled through the lavish rooms and into what must be the main dining room, judging by the wide variety of fresh food heaped upon the large table. Mason was already seated at the head of the table, and Hannibal was positioned at the opposite end whereas Will’s wheelchair was settled on one side of the table, halfway between them.

The guards changed their wheelchairs from standing-up to sitting-down; an appropriate modification for the occasion. Hannibal tested out his hand restraints as he stared directly at Mason with a polite smile.

“I snatched Will Graham right out of your mouth,” Mason mused. “You must be famished!”

A plate of fresh, raw Blue Point oysters were laid in front of Hannibal and he hummed. Oysters served to enhance one’s flavor, and he was impressed that Mason knew this and ordered such high-quality ones.

“There is an inescapable parallel between you and Jezebel, Mason,” Hannibal said lightly as he picked up his fork. “Keen Bible student that you are, you’ll recall dogs ate Jezebel’s face, along with the rest of her.”

The parallel really was quite amusing. If only Will’s dogs had eaten the rest of Mason along with his face.

“Well, if Jezebel was right with the risen Jesus, the Riz would have provided her with a new face, as He has provided mine,” Mason replied, teasingly raising his eyebrows at Will.

Hannibal placed a delicious oyster in his mouth as Will frowned, piecing together the meaning behind Mason’s words.

“The transplant surgery is extremely skillful,” Mason continued, “which is why Cordell here will be providing the face-off.”

Cordell placed the platter of food he just carried in onto the table and turned to smile at Will. “Hello.”

Hannibal turned his attention back to Mason, intrigued at his plans.

“You boys remind me of that German cannibal who advertised for a friend, and then ate him and his penis before he died,” Mason started.

Hannibal’s lips quirked, already entertained. 

“Tragedy being, the penis was overcooked. Go to all that trouble to eat a friend and you overcook his penis!” Mason lamented. “Well, they ate it anyway. They had to, they committed. But they didn’t enjoy it,” he remarked sadly.

“I’m committed to enjoying every  _ bite _ of you,” Mason promised.

“You’re going to eat him… with my face?” Will clarified.

Hannibal ate another oyster in amusement.

“Yes. I got a taste for it after you two had me eat my nose,” Mason drawled.

Hannibal was pleased. He couldn’t imagine a better end than being eaten by Will’s Graham’s magnificent face.

“You must be terribly proud that you could bring this off,” Hannibal stated. “It’s dangerous to get exactly what you want.” He tilted his head to the side. “What will you do after you’ve eaten me?”

“You could wreck some foster homes and torment some children,” Will offered.

“No,” Mason assured. “I’ll drink martinis made with tears.”

“But where, Mason, would the hard-core fun come from?” Hannibal wondered.

Mason clicked his tongue in disapproval. “It’s foolish to dilute such ecstatic times as this with fears about the future. Oh, Cordell, Mr. Graham is looking very dry. A little moisturizer, please.”

“I’m curious, what will be the first cuts of me you’ll serve?” Hannibal asked.

Cordell walked to a small side table to retrieve some moisturizer and perked up at the question, turning to face Hannibal. “The first course, of course, will be your hands and feet, sizzling on a Promethean barbecue. The coal is white and very hard, makes a clear ringing sound when struck.”

Hannibal smiled at him in approval before looking back at Mason. “You’ve thought of everything.”

Mason inclined his head in mock humility. “And after that, we’ll have a little pajama party, you and I. You can be in shorties by then. Cordell is going to keep you alive for a very long time.”

Suddenly, as Cordell leaned over Will with a dab of cream, Will surged upwards and violently bit at his face. His teeth remained locked on Cordell’s cheek for a long moment before he abruptly tore them away, ripping flesh with them. Blood immediately spurted out of Cordell’s face and the man screamed in pain as Hannibal’s breath caught, gaze zeroed onto Will.

Will chewed something in his mouth before he leaned forward and spat out a piece of Cordell’s cheek onto his dinner plate.

Hannibal stared, absolutely entranced at the fresh blood smeared on Will’s mouth and dripping off his chin. Will looked down at his plate for a second before slowly turning to lock eyes with Hannibal.

Hannibal had no idea what expression was showing on his face and he didn’t care; in that moment, he dropped his person-suit for Will and simply gazed back at him with all the overwhelming love and pride that was rushing through his body.  _ My vicious, wild boy. _

“Well, no pajama party for you, Mr. Graham,” Mason chided grimly. “We’ll be feeding you to the pigs as soon as Cordell removes your  _ face _ — in a much more civilized fashion than you just tried to remove his.”

With that, Mason jerked his head towards the guards who then retrieved Hannibal and changed his wheelchair to be standing-up again. Hannibal kept gazing at Will with incredible pride until his line of sight was broken and he was wheeled away from the man who never failed to surprise him.

* * *

Will yanked his head away from the wet rag that was being dragged across his mouth. He didn’t want to be cleaned up, he wanted Cordell’s blood to dry on his face, a visible reminder to Mason and the rest of the pigs that Will would not be played with. The guard attempting to remove the blood gave up at Will’s growl, and looked at Mason in exasperation.

“Leave him,” Mason dismissed. “Clean this up and let him sit in time-out. You’ve been naughty, Mr. Graham.”

Will ignored him and stared into space as Mason whirred away and the dining table was cleared of all food and tableware. Will was still sitting there as the lights were turned off, and he was left alone.

That was just fine with Will. He preferred to be alone, if being with Hannibal wasn’t an option anymore.

He thought about how Hannibal looked at him after he bit Cordell’s cheek off. His expression was the softest it’d ever been, and Will was still tingling from the blatant pride radiating from his eyes. He didn’t know what he thought about making Hannibal proud, but he sure knew how he felt about it. It felt undeniably  _ good. _

Will had to tear his eyes away from Hannibal’s face after mere seconds of direct contact, for fear of smiling back at him. He was still angry at Hannibal for cutting his head open, and would not allow Hannibal the pleasure of his true feelings. He feared he already gave too much away by immediately looking at Hannibal for approval after tearing off Cordell’s flesh.

Will sighed. He had enjoyed every second of the act, but wasn’t that the problem? He wasn’t  _ supposed _ to.

But then Will remembered Hannibal’s shining face again, and how Hannibal always wanted him to be proud of himself and embrace his instincts, and Will found it hard to be ashamed.

There was a sudden noise from the doorway and Will glanced up, doing a double-take at the sight of Alana Bloom.

“What are you doing here?” Will asked, more suspicious than surprised.

“I’m Mason Verger’s psychiatrist,” Alana answered seriously.

Will scoffed. “That part of his therapy, or yours?”

“I think we’re all working through some issues,” Alana replied, leaning on her cane as she walked to the nearest chair. “I’m putting an emphasis on self-preservation.”

She sat down heavily. “Jack’s alive.”

“Good for Jack,” Will mocked. He digested the new information that Alana was working with Mason now and considered how that played into current events.

“You helped Mason Verger find us,” Will accused.

Alana looked incredulous. “I helped Mason find Hannibal… We followed Batârd-Montrachet when we should have just followed you.”

Will ignored her pointed words. If she could not predict that Will was going to run after Hannibal the first chance he got, then she was deluded. They were blurred together, after all. A horrific package deal.

“Almost as ugly as what Mason wants to do to us is the fact that he can do it with the tacit agreement of people sworn to uphold the law,” he threw back.

Any remnant civility was erased from Alana’s expression. “I was trying to get to Hannibal before you. I knew you couldn’t stop yourself, so I had to try.”

Will huffed out a laugh. “By facilitating torture and death?”

“I can abide the thought of Hannibal tortured. Not necessarily to death. I’d say he has it coming, wouldn’t you?” Alana paused to study Will, her knowing eyes searching his bloodied face. “Or maybe you wouldn’t.”

Will looked away from her. He did not want to talk about Hannibal with Alana Bloom, of all people.

“What did you think would happen?” Will wondered.

“I thought Jack Crawford and the FBI would come to the rescue,” Alana replied lightly. “But the finer details of what I thought would happen have evolved.”

That caught Will’s attention. Her words suggested an opening, a tiny space of uncertainty that Will could insert a sliver of suggestion to manipulate the situation to his and Hannibal’s advantage.

“Then you have to evolve, Alana,” Will pointed out. “You have to spill blood. Either by your own hand, or…”

Will raised his gaze to lock eyes with Alana. “... Someone else’s.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second half will be out in 4 days, hopefully!


	9. Digestivo Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal rose from the floor of the pig pen, removing the irksome collar from his neck as he stretched to full height. He took a deep breath and filled his lungs completely for the first time in hours, feeling like a beast who had been bound in chains for fear of devouring the common folk. Hannibal’s eyes glinted with dark satisfaction as he let freedom wash over him like a wave.
> 
> The beast had been set free, ready to unleash its wrath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long-ish wait everyone! The holidays, you know?
> 
> This chapter is very long because it covers so much. The episode moved really fast, so I really took my time to stretch this chapter out so that it wouldn't feel rushed. Thus, I'm giving Will more time in this chapter to think about everything, and this is most evident when he wakes up in Wolf Trap - Hannibal does not immediately come inside and they don’t immediately strike up a conversation. There’s about a 5 minute gap for Will to collect his thoughts.
> 
> Anyways, I hope you enjoy feral Hannibal in the beginning to offset sad Hannibal at the end <3

Hannibal knelt naked in the rough hay with his arms spread out and tethered above him in the pig stall, and focused on his breathing. His body was aching from being forced to sustain such a position for an extended period of time, and the fresh brand on his back was itching and pulling tight at the skin.

Hannibal was no stranger to pain, and was able to regulate his experience of it with enough focus. He had trained his mind to receive the messages of pain with grace, which was why he only inhaled slowly when Cordell pressed the white-hot iron of the Verger seal to his back.

Hannibal was handling the discomfort of being trussed up like a show pig equally well. It was difficult to respire regularly in his current position, but he was compensating by taking shallow breaths more frequently. He only wished he had been allowed to keep the suit. Not for fear of catching a chill for being so exposed in the cold winter air, but rather because it was quite nice attire. 

Mason had gotten his personal style and measurements spot on. Hannibal was impressed.

He passed his time with the pigs observing the lone guard stationed near the exit. Hannibal was prevented from lifting his head too far by the collar around his neck, but he could just make out the guard reclining comfortably in a metal chair, a tranquilizer gun plainly resting on the table next to him. Hannibal was also aware of a real gun holstered at his side, and a knife that gleamed when the guard periodically removed it from his pocket to twirl.

Hannibal’s eyes were drawn to the glint of the blade, and he wondered how long it would take to coax the man into cutting through his restraints.

He was saved from testing out any theories by the appearance of Margot Verger, her Louboutin heels clacking elegantly against the brick floor.

“ _Buonasera, Signor_ ,” she bade the guard without a glance in his direction.

“ _Buonasera, Signora_ Verger.”

Margot slowed her approach as she got closer to Hannibal, her hesitance amusing him greatly.

“Thank you for coming, Margot,” Hannibal greeted her shoes. “Hasn’t been that long since I treated you. Have you started taking the chocolate, as Mason likes to say, after you fought him for so long?”

“Are we in therapy now?” Margot replied dryly.

“You tell me,” Hannibal exhaled. Talking was proving to be more taxing than breathing in this position.

Suddenly Margot got down on her knees in front of Hannibal’s pen, allowing Hannibal a clear glimpse of her vulnerable expression.

“Mason promised to give something back to me,” she shared quietly. “Something that he stole.”

Hannibal raised an eyebrow in interest.

“There was a surrogate all along,” she whispered. “It’s a Verger baby. It’s _my baby_.”

He studied her wet eyes and wobbly mouth. “Mason will deny you. He will always deny you. You know you’ll have to kill him.”

Margot gave a small, watery smile. 

“You saying you’d do it for me?” Hannibal remained silent and she sighed. “I could never trust you.”

“No, of course not,” Hannibal breathed heavily. “But you could trust me never to deny that I did it.” He heaved another breath. “It would actually be more therapeutic for you to kill him yourself. You’ll remember I recommended that in session.”

Margot smiled softly again. “Wait until I could get away with it, you said.”

“What difference would one more murder charge make to me?” Hannibal panted. “I’m the only other suspect you’ve got. You can do it when it suits you, and I’ll write a letter gloating about how much I enjoyed killing him myself.”

They stared at each other, before Hannibal’s attention was drawn away by the arrival of Alana Bloom. Her gait was different than he remembered, likely due to her injuries from being thrown out Hannibal’s second-story window, but her scent was the same.

“ _Buonasera_ ,” she murmured to the guard.

Before he had the chance to respond, Alana seized the tranquilizer gun from the table and shot the man in the throat, immediately knocking him out cold.

He fell to the ground with a thud, and Hannibal licked his lips.

“He has a pocketknife,” he called.

Alana bent down with some difficulty and retrieved said knife, gripping onto it tight as she hobbled over to join Margot.

“I was trying to save Will from you,” she stated through the wooden slates of Hannibal’s pen. “But right now, you’re the only one who can save him.”

Hannibal resisted the urge to rebuke her. Will didn’t need to be saved from him, he needed to be saved from his delusions of reality that restricted his true nature and the expectation of others that fed his instability.

“Promise me you’ll save him,” Alana demanded. “Please.”

“I promise,” Hannibal responded easily. “And I always keep my promises, Alana.”

He stared at her unblinkingly as she swallowed down her fear.

“Just cut the ropes on one arm, give me the knife, and leave,” Hannibal instructed. “I can do the rest.”

Slowly, Alana opened the gate to Hannibal’s pen and crouched down to be at eye level, just a breath away. Her gaze was hard and unblinking. The sliver of fear that Hannibal had seen in her moments ago had morphed into something akin to determination.

Alana really should thank him, one of these days. He’d made her into someone a lot stronger than who she used to be.

“Are you going to kill Mason?” Alana deadpanned.

Hannibal’s lips curved upwards. “Margot is. Snatch some of my hair, back from the hairline, if you don’t mind. Get some skin. Put it in Mason’s hand after he’s dead.”

They stared at each other for a moment, Alana remaining as still as death.

“Could I have ever understood you?” she whispered.

Hannibal considered laughing, but he respected Alana enough to give her a direct answer. 

“No.”

Will was the only one who could understand, and Hannibal was going to save him.

Alana yanked a handful of hair from Hannibal’s head, sawed through the ropes binding his right hand, and dropped the pocketknife in the hay. The two women left as Hannibal gnawed through the coarse rope on his wrist, only picking up the knife once his right hand was entirely free. He easily cut through the ropes securing his left arm, then sliced through the last two tethers connected to his collar.

Hannibal rose from the floor of the pig pen, removing the irksome collar from his neck as he stretched to full height. He took a deep breath and filled his lungs completely for the first time in hours, feeling like a beast who had been bound in chains for fear of devouring the common folk. Hannibal’s eyes glinted with dark satisfaction as he let freedom wash over him like a wave.

The beast had been set free, ready to unleash its wrath.

He stepped out of the pen and walked over to the unconscious guard. Tranquilizers generally last for about an hour, and by the time this guard woke up Hannibal imagined that he’d be long gone, a trail of blood in his wake.

He dressed himself in the man’s clothes, taking his time to make sure each article allowed for maximum functionality. The sweater was a bit tight but stretchy enough for Hannibal to move around in, whereas the pants were perfect, designed for flexibility in combat. The boots were on the small side, but a few paces around the room acclimated Hannibal to their fit. Before long, Hannibal fully adjusted to the clothes so that they fit like a second skin and he was ready for what lay ahead.

He gripped the knife in his hand and stepped over both guns, uninterested in such boring weapons, but there was an old hammer resting behind one of the pig pens that he retrieved. Hannibal much preferred the intimacy that blades and other close-contact instruments yielded, and took pride in the certain skill set and level of force required to wield them. Anyone could kill with a gun, making such tools inelegant and irrelevant to Hannibal.

He stalked down a hallway and made his way toward the exit using the mental map he created by paying attention during his restrained travels earlier. There were no guards in the first hallway, but when he spied into the second hallway he saw three armed men lining the long walls. Hannibal’s eyes focused on the nearest one and attacked, a knife in one hand and a hammer in the other.

He sprang at the first guy and slit his throat quickly, killing him before he even had time to move. The movement alerted the remaining two guards who turned and went for their guns, but Hannibal did not slow after slicing the first man’s throat and immediately went straight for the next guard. 

The guy’s eyes widened as he realized he was too slow on his draw and Hannibal slammed the hammer into his chest, breaking his ribs and puncturing his heart. Blood spurted out of his mouth and he went limp as Hannibal pulled the hammer from his chest with a wet squelch. 

The third guard — who Hannibal recognized, with a sharp smile, as the man who held a gun to Will’s head — finally retrieved his gun and fired, the bullets going straight into the wall as Hannibal ducked out of the way and rolled towards him.

He smashed the hammer into the guard’s foot with a bone-splintering crack. The man screamed and Hannibal left the hammer embedded in the foot so he could reach up and catch the wrist that held the gun. Now on his knees in front of the screaming shooter, Hannibal slashed the knife through his soft abdomen like he was cutting through butter.

Blood sprayed onto Hannibal’s face and he stood up as the guard swayed, the light fading from his eyes. He was dead, he just didn’t know it yet.

Hannibal retrieved the hammer as the doors at the end of the hallway banged open, two more guards charging in with guns drawn.

In the split second before triggers were pulled, Hannibal hurled the hammer through the air in a bloody arc. It spun quick as lightning and smacked into the skull of the man on the right, the momentum sending him to the ground with a heavy thud.

Hannibal used one hand to hoist the now-dead disemboweled man in front of him, shielding the rain of bullets from the remaining guard and driving straight towards him. The guard had nowhere to retreat to in the small hallway and shouted as Hannibal slammed the dead body into him, forcefully knocking him against the wall. Hannibal used the next second to throw his meat shield away, raise the knife, and slash the guard’s throat.

Hannibal turned to the man on the floor, pulling the hammer out of his head while cutting his throat at the same time. Just to be sure.

The hallway smelled of blood and gunsmoke as Hannibal left it, confident that he had dispatched all of Mason’s guards in the immediate vicinity. He dropped the knife and carried on with just the hammer, preferring the feel of the hardened wood as blood soaked into it. 

His chest heaved as he finally reached the exit, stepping outside to see the moon hanging above the snowy field backing up to the Verger estate. The stars were out, and Hannibal felt more liberated than he had in years.

He could leave now, run through the trees and never look back. He wouldn’t be caught. He could leave Will and simply be free.

The thought crossed Hannibal’s mind.

But he made his choice long ago.

Hannibal took a deep breath of cold, night air and turned back into the mansion, for the first time determined to save someone other than himself.

* * *

Will stared at the ceiling above him, hating that he couldn’t move from how tight his body was strapped into the surgical chair, including his head which was locked into place by a scary-looking vice. To top it all off, a chill was starting to settle into his bones as a result of being shirtless.

Will thought he had been pretty level-headed up until now. Even biting Cordell’s cheek was justified, as a method of self-defense.

But all that went away the moment he couldn’t move an inch. He no longer had the ability to lash out with his teeth like he had a few hours before.

Will was officially starting to panic.

He knew Mason designed it this way, for Will to be uncomfortable and freak out while waiting for his face to be inevitably peeled away. But not even the spite he felt for the ugly sadist could remedy his growing panic, and Will hated himself for it.

He thought he was strong, or at least strong enough to handle Mason Verger. If he could deal with Hannibal Lecter, he could deal with anything.

Or maybe not.

Will hadn’t been scared of the horrors in his life for so long now, he almost forgot what fear felt like. He did not appreciate the reminder.

He was glad to hear Mason being wheeled into the makeshift operating room, as it gave him something to focus on other than the overwhelming feeling of helplessness.

“Cordell told me if I waited long enough, he could grow me a new face from my own cells,” Mason greeted casually. “But I was adamant it was _your_ face I wanted.”

Will did not speak, his pointed silence his last tool of resistance.

“I was looking at your face while you were watching me cut mine off,” Mason continued, “and I thought, ‘Oh, that’s a nice face.’”

Will remembered that night; how metallic Mason’s blood had smelled, how grotesque he had looked under the moonlight, and how elegantly _powerful_ Hannibal had been.

“You’re going under now, Mr. Verger,” Cordell chimed in. “When you wake up, your face will be bound and uncomfortable.”

Will couldn’t see what was going on beside him, but he imagined that Mason was looking frightfully excited. Indeed, his dark brand of enthusiasm carried into his words when he next spoke.

“Have you accepted Jesus, Mr. Graham? Do you have faith?”

Will’s answer to that was such a resounding _no_ that it would have been comical if he was not still shivering from fear and the cold.

“I do,” Mason said happily. “I’m free! Hallelujah.”

With that, Mason went silent and Will heard his breathing start to even out, indicating that he had succumbed to unconsciousness. He could also hear Cordell’s heavy steps growing closer, and his heart raced with horrified anticipation.

Cordell entered Will’s line of sight and picked up a large needle connected to the waiting IV. Will hissed as the needle pushed into the tender skin on his inner arm, and tried to clench his fists to distract from the intrusion but found that his muscles would not obey his commands.

“This will immobilize your body, but you’ll feel everything.” Cordell hovered over Will and gave an eerie smile. “I’m going to cut off your face without anesthesia, Mr. Graham.”

Renewed panic coursed through his body along with the drug, and Will closed his eyes tightly. It was the only thing he could do to try and escape the present situation, although he knew with dread that there would be no real escape. 

Will hadn’t entered his mind palace in a while, but he desperately hoped he could do it now. Between the options of dissociation or enduring unimaginable pain as his face was cut off, Will grabbed onto dissociation.

Images flashed through his mind as he tried to run towards a safe haven. There was the stream where Abigail was, but Will couldn’t handle that right now. Castle Lecter was a possibility, but Will would rather not dwell on Hannibal’s trauma when he was trying to distract from his own.

As he felt Cordell mark his face with a felt-tip pen, Will’s breathing picked up and he ran faster through the possibilities in his mind. There was Hannibal’s office, Hannibal’s kitchen, the FBI forensic lab, the Uffizi Gallery — but none of those were comforting enough for Will, and his panic was growing. He wondered if it was possible to have a panic attack while your body was frozen, and feared he would soon find out.

Somehow in Will’s frenzied state of mind, the image of his house in Wolf Trap surfaced. He fixated on that memory and clung to it, clearly picturing the warm light spilling out of the windows into the night’s darkness. From Will’s position across the field, the house resembled a boat on the sea, floating in calm waters. He once told Hannibal, before everything happened, that it was one of the only times he truly felt safe.

The memory gave him the same feeling of safety now, and succeeded in stopping the impending panic attack. Will took a deep breath, pictured the soothing house that looked like a boat, and tried to forget where he was.

“You’ll be sure to let me know if this hurts, won't you?”

When the cold blade of a scalpel cut into the side of his face, Will’s ears rang and he pictured himself sprinting across the field towards that safe boat on the sea, trying to reach his dogs who never failed to comfort him.

Suddenly, the scalpel stopped cutting through Will’s face and fell to the floor with a clatter. Will’s eyes flew open, instinctively hopeful, and watched as blood trickled out of Cordell’s mouth. His eyes were glassy but he was obviously still alive as he moaned weakly, a status that was abruptly changed when a hammer swung from behind him to forcefully nail him in the temple, the crack of his skull music to Will’s ears.

Cordell crashed onto the floor to reveal Hannibal looming in the space behind him, soaked with blood and gripping a hammer.

“Apologies for letting him touch you,” Hannibal panted. “I have been rather busy.”

Will could do nothing except make blazing eye contact with Hannibal as relief flooded his paralyzed body. He hated how happy he was to see him. 

Hannibal studied Will for a moment and seemed to figure out his affliction with a quick glance around the surgical supplies. “Ah, a mild paralytic?” 

Will blinked in confirmation.

“I see,” Hannibal nodded, his breathing now evened out. “I would relieve you of its influence, dear Will, but I’m afraid I can’t have you interfere with what I’m about to do.”

_You asshole!_ Will screamed internally. _Take this fucking needle out of my arm right now!_

“I will remove the drug when the time is right,” Hannibal reassured, dropping the hammer and wiping his bloody hands on a blue towel before snapping on a pair of surgical gloves. “Until then, relax. I will get us out of here safely.”

_Shut up!_ Will wanted to yell. _We won’t be safe if you waste too much time on whatever fucking dramatic thing you have planned!_

Will seethed silently as Hannibal quickly closed the fresh cut on his face with expert stitches and turned to Cordell’s corpse. He knelt down on the floor out of Will’s line of sight, and a few moments later Will started hearing a series of wet, squishing sounds.

Will couldn’t see what Hannibal was doing but it didn’t sound good. He blinked hard in frustration, cursing Hannibal for his ill-timed violence. They didn’t have time to mutilate Cordell in whatever artistic way Hannibal had envisioned; they needed to get the hell out of this god-forsaken farm before Mason’s hired guns or the FBI reached them and they were trapped.

_Hurry up!_ Will shouted in his mind. _Hannibal, there’s no_ time.

Eventually, the gross noises stopped and Hannibal straightened up over Cordell’s body holding something big and fleshy in his hands. Will watched as he walked over to where Mason lay, still unconscious, and once again out of Will’s field of vision. There were new noises that sounded like fabric being threaded through metal, but Will couldn’t be sure.

_Finally!_ Will yelled inwardly. _Now can we get the fuck out of here?!_

“Hannibal,” a slightly distressed voice called.

_Why is Alana here?_ Will groaned to himself.

Hannibal reentered Will’s vision, shucking off gloves dripping with blood and placing a clean hand on Will’s leg protectively.

“Alana,” he acknowledged. “I did not think I would see you again tonight. Either of you.”

_Again?_ Will noticed, mind whirring. Did his little try at manipulation work out? Did Alana really release Hannibal?

He found himself feeling pleased at the likely possibility.

“My baby’s dead,” came Margot’s empty voice. “I want what Mason promised me.”

Will could see Hannibal’s eyes flicking around the room.

“Is that why you brought the cattle prod?” Hannibal asked lightly. “If you are so determined to do this, why do you need my help?”

Alana stepped forward then, walking up to Hannibal so that Will could see her cane in one hand and a cattle prod in the other. He still couldn’t see Margot, but from the way she sounded Will imagined that she was crying.

“I am not adept at finding men’s prostates,” Alana said dryly. “I figured you were.”

Will watched Hannibal’s lips curve up into a smile. “Indeed. But why would I help you?”

“Because we’ll stay out of your way and won’t call the police immediately after you leave,” Margot replied, voice shaking. “And because I’ll shoot you if you don’t.”

There was the sound of a gun cocking.

Hannibal tilted his head. “Not particularly convincing arguments.” He thought for a moment, then nodded. “Nevertheless, I will help you, Margot, because you asked me to.”

With that, Hannibal put on a clean set of surgical gloves and strode back over to Mason. Will wanted to scream again; he was so annoyed that Alana and Margot were apparently using Hannibal to harvest Mason’s sperm, delaying their escape from this place. He was even more annoyed at Hannibal for going along with it and leaving Will paralyzed on the table, half-naked, without a second thought.

Will closed his eyes again, but he could not shut out the noises that were emanating from right next to him, making it all too easy to imagine what Hannibal was doing. Will wanted to gag.

“The cattle prod, please,” Hannibal requested after some time.

Alana held it out to him wordlessly, averting her eyes. She was the only person in Will’s line of vision so he stared at her, but she did not look at him once.

Will heard the muted zapping of the cattle prod and felt nauseous. He couldn’t say that Mason didn’t deserve what was happening to him, but the procedure itself was incredibly unsettling, even in Will’s imagination. Apparently Hannibal made quick work of it, because before long he was back in Will’s vision handing off a suspicious vial to Alana.

Will stubbornly did not think about Hannibal’s noticeable expertise in milking prostates.

It was only after Alana clutched onto the vial that she glanced at Will. Hannibal intercepted her gaze and resumed his position in front of Will, a bare hand carefully removing the needle from his arm.

“I keep my promises, Alana,” Hannibal said lightly. “Now it is time for you to keep yours.”

Alana didn’t need to be told twice, swiveling on her cane back towards Margot. Once they had left, Hannibal turned to Will.

“I will return soon,” he vowed.

Will watched him slip away, feeling like ants were crawling under his skin. Although the panic from anticipating the loss of his face had subsided, Will’s body was buzzing from the consequential adrenaline that was only amplified by the new fear that Hannibal would not return. 

He wanted to scream, to fight, to run — but all he could do was wait, frozen, for Hannibal to return. If he ever did.

It was exactly Hannibal’s brand of humor, to leave Will paralyzed like this. When Will was last immobile, he couldn’t escape _from_ Hannibal. Now, if Hannibal left him, Will wouldn’t be able to escape _with_ him. 

His mounting anxiety was tempered by Hannibal’s sudden reappearance at his side. Will took a deep breath in relief — Hannibal wasn’t going to leave him this time — and noticed him holding a bloody sweater.

“My apologies, but this was the warmest clothing I could find short of raiding Mason’s closet,” Hannibal told him as he dismantled the restraints and tugged the shirt over Will’s head.

He was right. The sweater was warm, the fresh blood heating Will’s skin and stopping his shivers.

Without warning, Hannibal hoisted him up and carried him out the door. On the way, Will caught a glimpse of Mason with a mask over his face, and Cordell on the floor without a face.

Will closed his eyes and half-heartedly tried to fight the feeling of deep satisfaction seeping into his bones.

Hannibal’s steps were slow, but steady. He was panting again, understandable from the strain of carrying Will, but he did not falter. Not once, not even injured and exhausted, not even when they left the house and started cutting across the snowy field.

_He’s incredible,_ Will thought. He could feel Hannibal’s muscles bulging from being so closely pressed against him, and swallowed. _He really is a predator, a beast._

Suddenly, there were two soft pops and the sound of bodies dropping in the snow. Will could see nothing from his position except Hannibal’s face, and he watched it as Hannibal glanced behind them, then faced forwards again, nodding.

Will could not see, but he did not need to see to know that Chiyoh had protected Hannibal once again.

_She better have a car waiting,_ Will thought.

Chiyoh did have a car waiting. It only took a few more yards before Will felt Hannibal step out of the snow and onto hard ground, likely a road. A few seconds later, Will was being moved out of Hannibal’s arms and into the backseat of what appeared to be a four-door sedan. From the tough quality of the leather under Will’s cheek, he knew it was an expensive car. Expensive, and warm.

Will took a certain amount of pleasure in knowing that he and Hannibal were absolutely sullying Chiyoh’s fancy rental car with blood.

To Will’s surprise and annoyance, Hannibal did not sit with him in the backseat and instead slid into the passenger’s seat up front.

“Where to?” Chiyoh asked blandly, putting the car into drive.

Hannibal took a moment to catch his breath. “Wolf Trap, Virginia.”

Will exhaled loudly through his nose, but Hannibal ignored him.

He wasn’t sure what he thought about Hannibal taking him home. He wasn’t sure how he felt about Hannibal rescuing him. He just knew that he hated being so useless and passive, leaving Hannibal in charge of his fate. He also knew that it hurt him, right in his chest, to feel Hannibal carry him like something precious and head towards his home like it was the most natural place for him to go. 

The intimacy of it all burned Will’s throat like bad whiskey.

The warmth of the car invaded Will’s paralyzed body and soothed his tense muscles. He felt the noise in his mind get quieter, and his eyelids drooped with fatigue.

Hannibal must have noticed, like he always did, and spoke softly. “Go to sleep, Will.”

Will wasn’t strong enough to resist, and drifted off in a light slumber as Muskrat Farm faded into a bad dream.

The slamming of a car door roused Will from sleep, but only just. He was still disoriented and drowsy when Hannibal pulled him from the backseat of the car and carried him into the house.

His house.

Will licked his dry lips and groaned as he realized that he could move his face, but no other part of his body. “Mild” paralytic, his ass.

“Hannibal,” he whispered, just loud enough for the man to hear and look down at him in his arms.

“Can you move?” Hannibal inquired clinically.

Will tried to shake his head and was frustrated when he couldn’t. “No. Just talk.”

Hannibal carried him straight into the bathroom, setting him down next to the tub. “I imagine that’s quite irritating. As you cannot do so yourself, will you allow me to bathe you?”

“No,” Will scoffed. Hannibal looked much too pleased about the present situation for Will to allow him to do something so intimate. But… the dried blood from the sweater had crusted onto his skin and was beginning to itch.

The knowledge that Hannibal likely designed it that way with his choice of sweater was not enough for Will to hold onto spite and withstand such uncomfortable conditions.

“You can wash the blood off with a washcloth,” Will allowed, not bothering to hide his annoyance.

Hannibal nodded once and got to work peeling off the sweater. Will ignored him as best as he could, but that was hard to do with Hannibal in his personal space. It was even harder when he wet a washcloth and started wiping gentle circles on Will’s chest.

Will flashed back to a couple days ago, when Hannibal had cleaned his bullet wound from Chiyoh. He vividly remembered the way Hannibal had embraced him to take off his suit jacket, holding him for much longer than necessary. Will was not in blinding pain now like he was then, and he was very aware of how Hannibal was taking his time to wash away the dried blood flaking his skin. He was also aware of his own chest rising and falling as his breathing picked up without his permission.

“This is closing up nicely,” Hannibal murmured as he tenderly ran the washcloth over Will’s bullet wound. “There is no sign of infection.”

Will stubbornly remained silent, clenching his eyes shut. Hannibal’s words and actions conveyed a degree of gentleness that was painful. He recalled their conversation on the plane, when he let it slip that he craved tenderness between them, but not when it was painful. It was painful now, when Will was paralyzed and powerless to do anything but take the touches Hannibal bestowed upon him.

The intimacy between them was threatening to tear Will apart.

He opened his eyes to find Hannibal gazing back at him, less than a foot away. The washcloth had turned cold, but it didn’t matter as it seemed that Hannibal had finished cleaning him. He had not cleaned himself and blood was still splattered across his face, somehow making him even more handsome than he already was. The gore complimented him in a breathtaking way, or rather it burned off the person-suit that he often wore.

With Hannibal’s face covered and hair matted with blood, Will saw him for all he was.

_I let you know me. See me._

“I see you,” Will whispered, eyes once again fluttering in exhaustion.

He hated how much he loved what he saw.

Hannibal’s eyes were burning into him, and as Will’s heart rate slowed down he reached out to hold his limp hand.

“Seeing goes both ways. I see you, Will.” Hannibal squeezed his hand. “Sleep. I will be here when you wake.”

Will let his eyes fall shut, the promise sounding much more comforting that Will knew it should.

* * *

The next time Will woke, he felt the sun on his face and almost sighed with relief when he discovered he could move his body. 

He was in his bed, at home. Hannibal must have dressed him in clean clothes, then put him to bed. Will sat up in bed, glancing around to see that Hannibal was outside, talking to Chiyoh. 

He kept his promise. He didn’t leave.

Will stretched out his limbs, glad to be back in control of his own body, and thought about what could happen next.

He hadn’t planned for any of this to happen. When he left for Italy, he intended to find Hannibal and follow his instincts, whatever they happened to be. He did that, and ended up thrown off a train, shot, and almost eaten. Then, he got kidnapped by Mason Verger and almost had his face cut off before being killed.

Will had no idea what was going to happen next, and he was both scared and angry about the loss of control.

He was scared for natural reasons. Not having any control or power, especially when it came to his relationship with Hannibal, was terrifying. It reminded Will of the months after he first met Hannibal, when he was being played with like a toy. The prospect of anything remotely similar happening again was not an option. The next time Hannibal tried to drug him or manipulate him, Will could only hope that he had enough control left to stop him. He was afraid that he wouldn’t.

Perhaps more than that, Will was angry. He was angry that he always, _somehow_ , wasn’t in full control. Whether it be of himself or of the situation, it didn’t matter. Will was pissed that Hannibal always managed to hold more control, and that he _still_ had more control. He was walking around free, talking to Chiyoh, like everything was fine. Like he was untouchable.

While Will sat in bed, a slave to his maelstrom of emotions and always reacting, never acting. 

It all made Will seethe in anger, but it also made him incredibly and indescribably _tired._

He was physically exhausted from everything that had happened in the last few days. He had been mentally and emotionally exhausted for months, and seeing Hannibal in the flesh only made that worse. Hannibal occupied all of his thoughts because Will was constantly fighting himself over his feelings and second-guessing his decisions about Hannibal. Will wasn’t in agreement with himself about Hannibal, and he knew, at this rate, he never would be.

That level of fixation was exhausting.

Something had to change. Will _needed_ a change, he needed to do something, he needed to be in control again and make himself forget about Hannibal Lecter. 

If he didn’t, he would destroy himself before Hannibal ever had the chance.

_I’m curious whether either of us can survive separation._

Will needed to know if it was possible because he knew that the way things were going, he couldn’t survive being so conjoined.

Will leaned back against the soft pillows, and examined his options.

He couldn’t kill Hannibal. He’d had multiple opportunities to kill him, and each time discovered that he couldn’t do it. Besides, dying was the easy way out. There was no suffering there, and Will wanted Hannibal to suffer like he had suffered. 

Although Will’s heart yearned for it, he sure as hell couldn’t run away with Hannibal. The option only crossed his mind because his heart demanded to have an audience, but Will pushed it away with relative ease and minimal pain. He was too angry with Hannibal to join him.

Will could push Hannibal away, banish him to some unknown place. The idea was appealing, but deep down Will knew that it wouldn’t change anything. It would be like their eight months of separation all over again, of Will not being able to stop thinking about Hannibal and revolving his entire life around finding him again. He refused to repeat history.

The only other option, in Will’s mind, was prison.

His experience at the BSHCI was horrible. He felt isolated, alone, and crazy from having nothing but free time to think about the monsters inside and outside his head. If Hannibal went to prison, Will was sure he’d be going out of his mind with boredom and disgust for the terrible living conditions.

It was the perfect punishment for him, and the perfect way for Will to take back control.

It wouldn’t be easy to do. Hannibal wouldn’t just turn himself in on Will’s insistence; in fact, he’d most likely do the opposite of whatever Will suggested. Even if Will went that route, and told Hannibal to escape from the law, he wouldn’t respond by immediately turning himself in.

He would have to reject Hannibal.

Only then, rejected and tossed aside, would Hannibal surrender. There was no other option; Hannibal would simply keep running if he thought Will was still interested in him, whether that be in joining him or killing him. Will would have to convince him that he wanted nothing to do with him anymore.

Will had always found Hannibal difficult to read. It was ironic, that the man who understood him the best was the only one that Will could not immediately see with his empathy. Perhaps the problem was that they were too similar, and Will did not see Hannibal right away because he did not even want to see himself.

That was still true, but Will thought he could see Hannibal a lot better now. Hannibal could see him too, and if Will was going to try and manipulate Hannibal into turning himself in, then he needed to be completely honest. Luckily for Will, he had so many conflicting feelings about Hannibal that it shouldn’t be too hard.

However, if one part of him was telling the truth, that meant another part of him was lying.

Hannibal opened the door and came inside then, clean and bundled up in some of Will’s spare clothes. He walked over to the bed and retrieved a notebook Will hadn’t noticed before, its pages full of some sort of complex mathematical equations.

Will’s focus was drawn off the intriguing notebook and back onto Hannibal as he took a seat in a chair pulled right up to Will’s bed, positioned like Hannibal had been watching over him as he slept. The mental image was painfully intimate, like most things between them, and Will sighed.

“Do we talk about teacups and time and the rules of disorder?” Hannibal wondered, breaking the silence first.

Will closed off his face but kept eye contact. “The teacup is broken. It’s never going to gather itself back together again.”

Hannibal paused. “Not even in your mind?”

Will didn’t answer. He was too surprised to hear Hannibal be so vulnerable and so open with what he wanted. Although, the angry beast hiding under Will’s skin was purring at Hannibal’s begging.

Hannibal stared at him, and continued speaking when it became clear that Will would not respond. “Your memory palace is building. It’s full of new things. It shares some rooms with my own.” Hannibal’s eyes burned into Will’s. “I’ve discovered you there, victorious.”

Will shook his head minutely. “When it comes to you and me… there can be no decisive victory.”

Hannibal considered that. “We are a zero-sum game?”

Will sighed, breaking eye contact for a moment to look around his house. It had been sitting here, collecting dust, while Will was in Europe chasing Hannibal. He had even instructed Alana to put his dogs in a kennel while he was away. Will reminded himself that what he was about to do was to punish Hannibal and to take back control, so that he’d never uproot his life for Hannibal like that again.

“I miss my dogs,” Will confessed. “But I’m not going to miss you.”

He turned his head back to lock cold eyes onto Hannibal. 

“I’m not going to find you. I’m not going to look for you. I don’t want to know where you are, or what you do,” Will said evenly. 

He was lying, but he was being truthful at the same time. For Will, truth and lies had started to blur together just like him and Hannibal had. He took a deep breath to steady himself for the painful truth-lie that he was about to utter next.

“I don’t want to think about you anymore,” Will whispered.

Hannibal looked away and swallowed. His pain was palpable, but he was not alone in it. Will just had to make sure Hannibal was too blinded by his own pain to see Will’s.

“You delight in wickedness then berate yourself for the delight,” Hannibal finally chose to say.

“You delight,” Will murmured firmly. “I tolerate.”

Hannibal looked away again, blinking.

“I don’t have your appetite,” Will whispered, then choked out the final nail in the coffin. “Goodbye, Hannibal.”

Hannibal glanced at Will briefly, then looked down for a long moment before heavily rising from the chair. He slowly walked towards the door, pausing right in front of it like he hoped Will would take it all back. When Will remained stubbornly silent, Hannibal opened the door and walked away.

* * *

Hannibal’s ears were ringing as he walked out the door, onto Will’s porch, down the steps, and kept walking around the side of the house. He walked until tears obscured his vision and he stopped to lean against the side of Will’s house, for fear that he would stumble.

His heart had barely mended, and Will had broken it again. He had ripped the tender organ right out of Hannibal’s chest and eaten it, each brutal word a hungry bite.

Will didn’t want to think about him anymore.

He made other gut-wrenching proclamations, but that one summed them all up. Will — beautiful, radiant Will — did not want to think about Hannibal any longer. His wording was important; he did not say he _didn’t_ think about Hannibal anymore (because it was obvious he did, with how conjoined they were), he said he _did not want to_.

Will was making a conscious decision to carve out all remnants of Hannibal, and with it had carved out Hannibal’s heart from his chest.

This was different from betrayal, or simple indifference. Hannibal could accept it if Will simply lost interest in their connection, and no longer felt anything for him. It would hurt, but it would be a natural ending. Hannibal couldn’t imagine that his own feelings would decline so easily, but he could accept that Will’s would.

However, that wasn’t the case. Will wasn’t indifferent to Hannibal, he was pushing him away because, in spite of everything he felt for Hannibal and their bond, he didn’t want it.

_I gave you a rare gift, but you didn’t want it._

Will’s answer, back then, was to disagree. Even after Hannibal gutted him, Will avowed that he did want that rare gift of Hannibal’s true self, and the bond tethering them together.

But now, Will purposefully changed his mind. He had the gift, he had all that Hannibal was, but he didn’t want it.

_I don’t want to think about you anymore._

It was different from the last time Will had broken his heart. There was no betrayal here, no attempt to get close to Hannibal and hurt him. The problem was, there was no attempt to get close to Hannibal at all. There was only rejection.

Mindful, forceful rejection of Hannibal, their connection, and all the beautiful parts that made Will who he was. After everything they had been through together, everything they had done to each other, Will decided that he had enough. He dismissed Hannibal with the severity and harshness that one would reject unwanted company.

He supposed that’s all he was to Will now. Unwanted company.

Hannibal took a deep breath and collected himself, wiping the stray tears off his face. He was resilient. He could fight this. He could withstand the blood spilling out of his stabbed heart. 

He refused to be tossed aside so coldly. He did not accept Will’s insistence on forgetting.

Hannibal was going to make it so that Will could never forget where he was, or what he was doing. He was not going to give Will the ignorance he desired. When he was finished, Will would have no choice but to think about him for a very long time.

Killing him didn’t even cross Hannibal’s mind. He had tried that in Florence, and he would never try to do so again. It would be like killing himself.

It was then that he heard the unique sound of footsteps crunching snow and glanced up to see Chiyoh approaching slowly, still holding her rifle and looking a touch concerned.

“What happened?” she ventured.

Hannibal walked towards her, grounding himself with each step. “Will rejected me.”

Chiyoh furrowed her brow.

“I will not intrude and ask for details,” she said after some thought, “but if he expressed apathy towards you, he is lying.”

_I’m not going to miss you._

Hannibal tilted his head. “How did you reach that conclusion?”

Chiyoh looked away. “At home, after he manipulated me into killing my tenant…”

Hannibal’s heart stuttered.

“... He made a monument to you out of the body. I do not think he realized that I saw, but I did.”

Hannibal wet his lips. “What was it?”

“Transformation,” she replied softly. “A larva growing wings, transforming into a firefly. He placed some of your leftover snails on the body, and when he hoisted it up the glass wings spread out and glinted as fireflies swarmed around it. It was beautiful.”

Hannibal closed his eyes and imagined it. He saw Will constructing the new creature’s wings, gently setting snails on the body to grant them a nice meal, and gazing upon his own creation when he finished. Hannibal wished he could see it in the flesh, but the mental image was enough to make him breathless.

_I can feed the caterpillar, and I can whisper through the chrysalis, but what hatches follows its own nature and is beyond me._

Will must have thought of those words when he made the monument. Hannibal smiled, his broken heart healing just a little bit with the pride he felt for Will’s creation. The knowledge that Will had embraced his darkest instincts while visiting Hannibal’s childhood home was gratifying. He had gone there to learn more about Hannibal, but he had learned about himself in the process.

Hannibal speculated that his firefly was magnificent. He vividly remembered how Will displayed Randall Tier, shaping him into the creature that he truly was inside. It seemed as if the art Will created was more animalistic in nature, and Hannibal was in awe of its beauty.

However, it was not enough to change the magnitude of Will’s proclamation.

Hannibal nodded to himself and locked eyes with Chiyoh again. “Thank you for telling me. Even so, Will has made his choice.”

Chiyoh studied him. “And you have made yours.”

“Yes,” Hannibal affirmed. “The cage awaits.”

It was the natural reaction simply because it was something Will would never expect from him. Hannibal had spent so long evading capture because prison held no interest for him, and also because it brought Hannibal pleasure to hoodwink law enforcement so thoroughly.

Will would not expect that Hannibal would willingly go to prison only when Will had given up on caging him. It would surprise him, infuriate him, and pull him back into Hannibal’s orbit so that he would have no choice but to think about him.

“Some beasts shouldn’t be caged,” Chiyoh sighed, repeating her words from earlier.

Hannibal patted her shoulder. “You do not have to watch over me in the cage, my dear, but do not inhibit my ability to enter it.”

With that, Hannibal turned and entered Will’s garage, content to nurse his bleeding heart and wait among the boat motors until Jack Crawford came knocking.

* * *

Will went outside only when he saw the flashing lights.

He had not followed Hannibal earlier, nor had he called him back and retracted his harsh rejection. Will thought about doing so, had wrestled with the possibility in his mind many times over the hours spent inside his house, staring into space while the sun set and the sky darkened.

In the end, Will had succeeded. He had stopped himself from picking up the pieces of Hannibal that he had just shattered.

Jack hadn’t called Will to ask where Hannibal was before showing up at his house with what looked like dozens of FBI agents, all armed to the teeth. It was just shy of 24 hours since he and Hannibal had left Muskrat Farm, meaning that Alana and Margot hadn’t yet alerted the authorities of their whereabouts, either. 

Jack must have gone to the FBI right after he got back from Florence, then headed straight to Will’s house, like he knew that he and Hannibal would escape Mason’s clutches and hide out here. 

Will had to give Jack some credit. For once, he knew just where to find Hannibal.

“He’s gone, Jack,” Will called from the porch as Jack and the rest of the FBI agents swarmed his property. Will really hoped Hannibal wasn’t gone, and that his manipulation worked.

But at the same time, he hoped that Hannibal _had_ left.

Will clenched his fists where he stood, waiting for Jack to respond. He wondered if he could ever escape the constantly opposing emotions he felt for Hannibal and supposed that, one way or another, he was about to find out.

Suddenly, a voice cut through the falling snow.

“Jack! I’m here.”

Hannibal walked out of the shadows of Will’s driveway with his hands up. Agents in full tactical gear immediately surrounded him but Hannibal went to his knees willingly, without prompting. 

Will’s heart pounded at the sight, one that he never thought he’d actually see.

“You finally caught the Chesapeake Ripper, Jack,” Hannibal mused, of course unable to resist mocking Jack in this moment. Will nearly snorted.

“I didn’t catch you,” Jack scoffed. “You surrendered.”

Hannibal paused, his coolly amused mask morphing into a more serious expression. 

“I want you to know exactly where I am,” he murmured. “And where you can always find me.”

He glanced sideways at Will, but he didn’t need to look at him to make it abundantly clear that it was Will he was talking to, not Jack. Will gazed back at him stonily, feeling a piece of himself break off and fall into the snow alongside Hannibal.

It was as if time froze for a second. Will could see the snow framing Hannibal’s face, each little fresh cut illuminated by multiple FBI flashlights. He etched this moment into his memory palace, determined to memorize everything about it because he wanted, _needed_ , it to be the last time he saw Hannibal. 

He needed to survive on this memory, and this memory alone, in those dark times when he knew he would be tempted to forge a new memory with Hannibal.

Will stared directly into Hannibal’s eyes and filed away the genuine vulnerability, care, and loyalty he saw shining out. Will _saw him,_ he saw his heartbreak, his stubbornness, his resolution, and his hope. He saw everything that Hannibal had become, and just how much Will had changed him. 

He also saw his own changes reflected in Hannibal’s eyes, framed with pride.

Will thought that he should feel triumphant that his manipulation worked, or at the very least satisfied to have finally taken some control back from Hannibal.

But all he felt was cold.

Will looked away and turned to go back inside, back into the warmth that he knew wouldn’t rectify the numbing cold seeping into his bones and settling in his heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What did you think??
> 
> As y’all know, after this we have a three year time skip before the Red Dragon arc picks up. I AM writing about what happened in those 3 years, including: Hannibal’s trial, how Will dealt with that, Hannibal in prison, and how Will ended up married. [That fic will be here,](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28272309/chapters/69283308) and I will finish it before continuing this story for the sake of the timeline. I hope to see y’all over there! <3


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